SAE Mark XXX 1B (31B) Power Amp - Opinions or Experience

[ictwoody]

Hey guys,

I have the chance to maybe pick up a pair of these at a decent price. I'm wondering what the general opinions of this specific model are? I know the earlier SAE stuff is considered better, and it seems like these are on the cusp.

How would one classify or describe their sound?

I know they are only rated at 50wpc, and since I would only be using them for 2ch listening I was wondering if they were bridgeable?

Does anyone have any listening time on this particular model? I'd like to get a power amp or amps to build a system using a passive preamp setup and thought these might be a good option.

Thanks,
Woody

 

[bobaloniny]

Got one and a Mark 30 pre with it. I think its a wonderful sounding amp, I have it in my puter/tv sys that includes a r2r and a tt. For its size its a heavy little beast and according to specs makes more like 60 ish wpc. Nice detail and leans a little to warm sound, just right for me.
On the cusp? As far as the end of the old school just before SAE 2?
When I first got it and the preamp, I was fooling around with it, had it hooked up to a dbx cdp and a pair of Celestion UL8s. I spun Santanas Supernatural and sat there mesmerized, it sounded sooo good. Sure everything else had a hand in it, but the amp as far as Im concerned certainly delivered well.
Dont know off hand about bridgable though, sorry.

 

[Rob41]

I saw those with a BIN of $100 each. That's a good price for those amps.

 

[ictwoody]

I saw those with a BIN of $100 each. That's a good price for those amps.

Haha... you got me.

Here's the rest of the story so far. Ethical or not, I made a deal with the seller outside of the 'Bay and he ended the auctions. I don't condone this :nono:, and won't do it myself usually... but since there was less then 24hrs left and he didn't have any bids (I'm sure the snipers were all ready) I don't feel too bad about it.

I am willing to give them a try... I need some speakers that have bi-amping capabilities, but whatever... I love that they are sequential serial numbers.

I gave less then his BIN's for the pair So if I don't like them I'm sure I will have no problem getting my money back out of them.

Now I just need to figure out what I am going to do for a pre-amp... actually thinking about maybe using a Grant Fidelity TUBE DAC-11 as the passive pre. I am trying to figure out how it would stack up against some other tube preamps under $500-600. I know the DAC-09 bested some pretty good gear and they say the 11 is better.

It has 3 digital inputs and 2 analog inputs which is more then enough for me since I only use a MacMini via USB or Optical, a TT (which I was planning on getting an OB phono stage/amp for anyway), and a Sony HD tuner as sources.

But overall I think I did Okay on a clean set of 50WPC amps... excited to find out.

- Woody

 

[Rob41]

Congrats, you got a great deal on those. Less than a couple hundred bucks doesn't go very far these days....well I guess it did for you. Cool.

 

[taineasy]

SAE 31B (XXXIb) keeps overheating and shutting down via the thermal sensor. It runs and sounds great for about a half hour and then shits down without blowing any fuses. Bias is set at 2.1mv and complementary transistors are Vbe matched.. Anyone have any ideas?

 

[sregor]

Better if you just started new thread.

Unstable bias could be poor physical connection between bias IC and heat sink, or bad bias IC. There was a bulletin about cleaning flux off the bias IC solder connections, but I never had one that this made a difference with.
Could also be bad output transistor, but not likely.

Side note - manuals show outputs (SAE103 and SAE204) as regular transistors but they are darlingtons.

 

[hamrules]

2.1vdc I think you meant. What’s the DC Offset at?

 

[Dswankey]

..I have the chance to maybe pick up a pair of these at a decent price. I'm wondering what the general opinions of this specific model are?

11 years later

SAE 31B (XXXIb) keeps overheating and shutting down via the thermal sensor. It runs and sounds great for about a half hour and then shits down without blowing any fuses. Bias is set at 2.1mv and complementary transistors are Vbe matched.. Anyone have any ideas?

Better if you just started new thread.

@taineasy

I agree, the original intent was on opinions or experience if the OP should purchase, not repair related.