Pre/Power Amplifiers

Hi-fi’s style icons of the ’60s are reimagined here over a half century later combining a sympathetic industrial design with a performance beyond the reach of its ancestors

It’s taken long enough but Quad has finally revived one of the best-selling pre/power amp combinations of all time. Between 1967 and 1982, 120,000 Quad 33 ‘control units’ were sold, while the 303 power amplifier remained in production until 1985 to reach 94,000 sales. So these new Quad 33 and 303 models have big shoes to fill, but retaining the original model designations and dimensions are a start. And that’s pretty much where the resemblance stops. Welcome to the 21st century.

A compact MOSFET amplifier module, designed in Denmark, is tickled-up with tech from ex-members of the Vertex AQ crew. So is this Quiescent unit a boutique barnstormer?

One of the annoyances of modern life is noise. Outside, our ears might be assaulted by traffic roar, construction clamour or roadworks cacophony, plus buzzing leaf blowers and lawn mowers. Indoors, however, it’s rather more subtle. The prevalence of wireless communications around the house, plus the switched-mode power supplies that run pretty much everything, mean the noise is electrical in nature – and more insidious. Enter the £21,900 T100SPA power amplifier from the aptly-named Quiescent, which aims not only to delight your ears, but also ensure this ever-present noise doesn’t get in the way of the music.

You'll have to examine the £5399 Michi M8 monoblock power amp very closely to see how it differs from the company's S5 stereo model, reviewed previously alongside the £3299 P5 preamplifier [HFN May '20]. The two are the same price and size, look identical and have much the same 'ask a friend to help' mass. In fact, the M8 weighs marginally less than the S5, at 59.1kg – the difference presumably accounted for by the need for two-channel inputs on the stereo amp whereas the mono version has only single-channel connections, on both balanced XLR and unbalanced RCA sockets.

Michi is back: last marketed in the 1990s, Rotel's elite sub-brand has rejoined the hi-fi fray after a three-year development project, and the establishment of a dedicated facility within the company's factory to hand-build the new products. And I have to admit to a pang of nostalgia for I reviewed the company's RHCD-10 player, slimline RHA-10 preamp and substantial RHB-10 power amp back in the dim and distant, and it was a case of lust at first listen, not to mention sight of the high-quality metalwork with its red-lacquered wooden side-cheeks.