I recently built a system using an SAE P102 preamplifier. I think it’s cool and unusual, and extremely flexible. But the noise level is a touch above inaudible, and there was no way my wife could figure it out.
Sound-wise, it’s a good early 80’s preamp with some interesting features. But it is an early op-amp design, and there is room for extending the frequency response as we learned to do later.
(I also thought I had a problem with the processor loop, but that turned out to be relays in the E101 equalizer, and replacing those solved the problem. But I had already started researching newer designs.)
I spent time in the Audio magazine archives. The target year for my system is 1990, just to have some sort of theme, and to find the sweet spot between old enough to be cheap but not old enough to be collectible. SAE was done by 1990–Morris Kessler had sold out to a record producer in 1988 who sold out 8 months later to DAK who blew out the inventory and shut it down.
I compiled a list of requirements:
-two tape loops. I keep a cassette deck available for vintage private location recordings available no other way, and I wire my computer interface into Tape 2.
-a defeatable processor loop.
-sensible tone controls that are defeatable.
-phono input. I’m not prepared to buy a separate phono preamp. Moving magnet is fine, but I wanted a first-class phono preamp.
-independent listening and recording selectors, which are Understandable By Wife.
-S/N over 100 dB in the line stage. The SAE was 90.
-uncoupled outputs and a minimalist signal path, but I still want an active preamp and lots of control options.
-independent reviews validating quality in the context of the time. This wasn’t easy—archives from 1990 are spotty. I have my own ears, but I also respect experience, especially from those who have experience listening to high-end stuff.
-under half a kilobuck. I paid $110 for the SAE.
There were only a handful of preamps that met those requirements in the 1990 Audio Magazine Equipment List. Carver, Soundcraftsman, etc. A Bryston caught my interest, but by the time I adddd a decent phono amp it was going to cost too much. And too few of the excellent B&K preamps have phono stages.
I narrowed it down to two: the Kenwood Basic C2 and the Adcom GFP-565. (The later vaunted Adcom GFP-750 didn’t meet all the requirements, and it was too pricey). I have a C1 and a GFP-555, so I like both brands.
I went with the TOTL Adcom on the force of two factors: The C2 is just too complicated on the front panel while being rather limited on the back panel. And the Adcom was very favorably reviewed by several reviewers, including several at Stereophile, whose opinions I listen to even when I’m skeptical.
It took me a couple of tries to get one in perfect condition.
What a great preamp! Sound clarity is superb, with no grittiness or switchiness. The tone controls are subtle enough to be useful, centering as they do the bands at the limits of hearing rather than making humps or holes in the audible band. And the tone amps are constrained. With music, turning the tone controls has only a subtle effect. The preamp has a bypass output, but these tone controls are useful, so I used the lab outputs. .
The electrolytic caps are high-precision Panasonics and as long as the faulty batch (the ones that tended to explode) is avoided there is no need to change them yet. All the caps in the signal path are high-spec film caps, just as are the resistors. After a DeOxit treatment, there was nothing else to do under the cover.
The preamp’s gain takes it to a maximum of 2 volts RMS, against the 1-volt RMS input sensitivity of my B&K amp. There’s no chance of clipping the preamp, but the amp is only leaving 6 dB (out of well over 100) on the table, and it has good headroom. I can’t make it noticeably clip before reaching levels intolerably loud. And I think it will go into protection before clipping. Just testing it required the wife to be out of town.
The phono preamp is simply superb. At full output, I can just hear slight cartridge hiss—every cartridge is at least a little microphonic—but with shorting plugs the phono input is a black hole. The turntable is a Thorens TD166II with a Grado Green2 cartridge.
I played a very old and rather scratchy bargain-bin pressing of E. Power Biggs playing the Sion organ in Switzerland—the oldest playable organ in the world, made in 1390. I thought—ooh, strident—and then I realized that the organ stops he was using at first were strident. But when he played the flutes, I could hear every delicate detail of the complicated connection between fingers and pipes.
But the pops and clicks of the vinyl surface were rather subdued. This album had been marginal previously. I read a review which claimed the phono preamp was smooth in how it dealt with surface defects, and I was skeptical, but the difference is quite noticeable.
By the way, I only use the equalizer and tone controls for when the music is too bass-heavy, like some rock recordings (ELP—a reference for me) and electronica (Tubular Bells). For jazz and classical, a press of the tone and processor switches and they are gone.
It’s been said that there are no bad preamps, because preamps are made for people already discerning enough to buy separates. I would agree. But some are better than others. The 565 is much better than the 555, and the SAE P102 probably sits between them. My Kenwood C1 probably sits between the SAE and the 565.
Another addition: Musical Fidelity V90 DAC. So, my CD signal path is now: Tascam CD-401 (vintage 1990), coax digital output to V90, to Tape 2 input to preamp, to GFP-565 line stage amp (tone and processor usually defeated), to B&K Reference 125.2 amp, to stacked Advent NLAs. Not a bad mostly vintage mid-fi quality chain.
Rick “notching things up a bit” Denney
Sound-wise, it’s a good early 80’s preamp with some interesting features. But it is an early op-amp design, and there is room for extending the frequency response as we learned to do later.
(I also thought I had a problem with the processor loop, but that turned out to be relays in the E101 equalizer, and replacing those solved the problem. But I had already started researching newer designs.)
I spent time in the Audio magazine archives. The target year for my system is 1990, just to have some sort of theme, and to find the sweet spot between old enough to be cheap but not old enough to be collectible. SAE was done by 1990–Morris Kessler had sold out to a record producer in 1988 who sold out 8 months later to DAK who blew out the inventory and shut it down.
I compiled a list of requirements:
-two tape loops. I keep a cassette deck available for vintage private location recordings available no other way, and I wire my computer interface into Tape 2.
-a defeatable processor loop.
-sensible tone controls that are defeatable.
-phono input. I’m not prepared to buy a separate phono preamp. Moving magnet is fine, but I wanted a first-class phono preamp.
-independent listening and recording selectors, which are Understandable By Wife.
-S/N over 100 dB in the line stage. The SAE was 90.
-uncoupled outputs and a minimalist signal path, but I still want an active preamp and lots of control options.
-independent reviews validating quality in the context of the time. This wasn’t easy—archives from 1990 are spotty. I have my own ears, but I also respect experience, especially from those who have experience listening to high-end stuff.
-under half a kilobuck. I paid $110 for the SAE.
There were only a handful of preamps that met those requirements in the 1990 Audio Magazine Equipment List. Carver, Soundcraftsman, etc. A Bryston caught my interest, but by the time I adddd a decent phono amp it was going to cost too much. And too few of the excellent B&K preamps have phono stages.
I narrowed it down to two: the Kenwood Basic C2 and the Adcom GFP-565. (The later vaunted Adcom GFP-750 didn’t meet all the requirements, and it was too pricey). I have a C1 and a GFP-555, so I like both brands.
I went with the TOTL Adcom on the force of two factors: The C2 is just too complicated on the front panel while being rather limited on the back panel. And the Adcom was very favorably reviewed by several reviewers, including several at Stereophile, whose opinions I listen to even when I’m skeptical.
It took me a couple of tries to get one in perfect condition.
What a great preamp! Sound clarity is superb, with no grittiness or switchiness. The tone controls are subtle enough to be useful, centering as they do the bands at the limits of hearing rather than making humps or holes in the audible band. And the tone amps are constrained. With music, turning the tone controls has only a subtle effect. The preamp has a bypass output, but these tone controls are useful, so I used the lab outputs. .
The electrolytic caps are high-precision Panasonics and as long as the faulty batch (the ones that tended to explode) is avoided there is no need to change them yet. All the caps in the signal path are high-spec film caps, just as are the resistors. After a DeOxit treatment, there was nothing else to do under the cover.
The preamp’s gain takes it to a maximum of 2 volts RMS, against the 1-volt RMS input sensitivity of my B&K amp. There’s no chance of clipping the preamp, but the amp is only leaving 6 dB (out of well over 100) on the table, and it has good headroom. I can’t make it noticeably clip before reaching levels intolerably loud. And I think it will go into protection before clipping. Just testing it required the wife to be out of town.
The phono preamp is simply superb. At full output, I can just hear slight cartridge hiss—every cartridge is at least a little microphonic—but with shorting plugs the phono input is a black hole. The turntable is a Thorens TD166II with a Grado Green2 cartridge.
I played a very old and rather scratchy bargain-bin pressing of E. Power Biggs playing the Sion organ in Switzerland—the oldest playable organ in the world, made in 1390. I thought—ooh, strident—and then I realized that the organ stops he was using at first were strident. But when he played the flutes, I could hear every delicate detail of the complicated connection between fingers and pipes.
But the pops and clicks of the vinyl surface were rather subdued. This album had been marginal previously. I read a review which claimed the phono preamp was smooth in how it dealt with surface defects, and I was skeptical, but the difference is quite noticeable.
By the way, I only use the equalizer and tone controls for when the music is too bass-heavy, like some rock recordings (ELP—a reference for me) and electronica (Tubular Bells). For jazz and classical, a press of the tone and processor switches and they are gone.
It’s been said that there are no bad preamps, because preamps are made for people already discerning enough to buy separates. I would agree. But some are better than others. The 565 is much better than the 555, and the SAE P102 probably sits between them. My Kenwood C1 probably sits between the SAE and the 565.
Another addition: Musical Fidelity V90 DAC. So, my CD signal path is now: Tascam CD-401 (vintage 1990), coax digital output to V90, to Tape 2 input to preamp, to GFP-565 line stage amp (tone and processor usually defeated), to B&K Reference 125.2 amp, to stacked Advent NLAs. Not a bad mostly vintage mid-fi quality chain.
Rick “notching things up a bit” Denney
