Townshend Allegri+ Passive Preamplifier
Our price: £2,495.00
What HFL Thinks
Townshend Allegri+ – At HiFi Lounge we are really pleased to offer Townshend Audio products as they really do make a difference and will really help to get the best out of your HiFi System. Isolation is one area that can be really overlooked as a system is being put together but by adding any of the Townshend Audio products you will help unleash the true potential of your system as it will isolate it from any negative vibration that can really degrade sound quality so please come into HFL to hear the difference Townshend Audio can make to your system.
- Unrivalled sound quality with crystal clear treble, open mid-band and subterranean bass
- Ultra high end performance in a small package
- Purely passive Autotransformer design wired throughout with Fractal-Wire™ to perfectly match any source component with any power amplifier
- No mains noise, no electronic hash and no requirement for esoteric mains conditioners or power cord
The Allegri+ Passive Autotransformer preamp is exceptionally transparent, has absolutely no noise and has enormously wide bandwidth.
It has vanishingly low distortion, very powerful and deep bass and amazing drive throughout the audio band. Treble is crystal clear with not a hint of hardness or brashness. It just sounds right!
The nature of the transformer design eliminates the problems usually associated with resistive passive controls. At the zero dB setting the input signal is directly connected to the output. This means that the output impedance of The Allegri+ is the same as the output impedance of the source component. Further, the input impedance of The Allegri+ is equal to the input impedance of the power amplifier at this setting.
At -6dB (output voltage half the input voltage), the input impedance of The Allegri+ is four times the input impedance of the power amplifier and the output impedance of the Allegri+ is one quarter of the source impedance.
At -20dB (10 to 1), the input impedance of the Allegri+ is one hundred times the power amplifier impedance and the output impedance of the Allegri+ is one hundredth of the impedance of the source component. It is thus clear that the interconnect cable capacitance will have no effect on the performance of the Allegri+.
There are no coupling capacitors or active devices in the signal path in The Allegri+ and the absence of a noise-injecting power supply guarantees ultimate sound quality.
The Allegri+ has a six-position input selector, a mute switch and a 24-position volume control with intervals chosen to cover a wide range of volume levels in different systems. Its state-of-the-art autotransformers are wound with Townshend Audio Fractal-Wire™ and laminated with ultra-thin mu-metal laminations for the highest possible resolution. There are six pairs of gold plated stereo phono inputs and two pairs of outputs and a 3.5mm input jack on the front panel. The case is made of anodised aluminium.
Preamps of today do not require gain as all quality source components have an output of about 2 volts with a low output impedance. Any competent power amplifier will achieve full output with typically 1 volt and have a high input impedance. Unlike conventional passive controllers the Townshend Allegri+ matches the impedance requirements of source and amplifier so that full dynamics are retained.
Features
- Fractal-Wire ™, results in the most accurate, uncoloured and open-sounding preamplifier possible – with astonishing transparency and resolution of fine detail.
- Autotransformer Passive Stereo Preamplifier A high fidelity line level controller that selects 6 RCA phono inputs, adjusts gain and provides 2 RCA phono outputs.
- Purely passive device eliminates signal degradation caused by mains-born noise.
- 6 inputs, 2 outputs.
- 24 position volume control provides gain change from +4dB to -60 dB.
- Mute switch to select off at any volume setting.
- DC coupled with no capacitor in the signal path for ultimate sound quality.
Design
After 40 years of research encompassing all styles of amplification – including discrete transistor (bipolar & FET), integrated circuit, valve (tube) and digital – we have found that all active implementations inevitably cause a slight veiling, noise and detail loss.
Furthermore all volume controls – potentiometers (carbon, plastic film and Cermet), switched resistor, optical and digital – similarly cause varying degrees of veiling and detail loss.
Conventional transformer volume controls are excellent. However it is very difficult to achieve a flat frequency response at all volume settings due to the stray capacitance reacting with the unterminated coil sections.
The claim that transformer controls allow for balanced operation is only partly true as the circuit cannot be fully balanced due to asymmetry in the configuration. Allegri is special because it uses an autotransformer for volume instead of a potentiometer. A potentiometer is like an automatic car where the accelerator is on full and speed is regulated by the brake, an autotransformer is more like a manual car where speed is controlled by an accelerator. Also, the use of Fractal-Wire™ reduces losses to virtually zero.
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