New to me C100

motorstereo

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Yes yesterday was the day for me to retire my C33 to a secondary rig and give a C100 a shot, I've had it about 24 hours now and I must say I completely agree with the great reviews this awesome pre seems to get. As much as I liked my 33 (up until yesterday it was the nicest pre I've ever owned) the 100 is in a whole nuther league. The clarity and dead silent background are amazing. What really surprises me is that even crappy sources such as fm and bluetooth are now listenable. Cd's are amazing and I've already picked up on a phrase on a well known recording that wasn't understandable before the C100. I'm not too much into vinyl but I just may start listening to it after playing a couple records. This thing just seems to do everything right.

The only thing I didn't like about it though was the real estate is uses up. It took some head scratching and a while to reconfigure my rack. In the end it was well worth the extra effort and I think it fits in well with the both the newer and the older gear as well.

One other thing I've noticed is vintage Mac is really nice gear but the newer stuff really is much nicer. I just wish I could afford more of it. Thanks Leftside for a good deal on a great pre and X3workshop to for answering a lot of my questions.
 

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Wow Brian...Congrats!.....You've been busy!!! I haven't been to your place for a while, but man you've got some serious gear there
 
Thanks Bob. I swear this crazy hobby just gets more fun all the time. Have you landed your MC30's yet?
 
Congratulations on your new acquisition. It sounds like you already like yours as much as the rest of us do.
 
Hi Brian , congratulations on your new preamp , if I don't have a C48 already then your C100 will be mine . I almost pull the trigger on that one . Now I have to look for the C200 . :beerchug:
 
Hey Paulvo; The 100 matches up very well with the 2500's and I'm thinking the 200 will also. Good luck to you in landing one.
 
Now see ... I knew you were gonna' take the plunge when I saw your "PM with interest" reply!

Congrats - these are phenomenal preamps by any standards!
 
Thanks Tony; You're partly to blame to as you said it was a good deal:). It also looks like I pulled the trigger just in time as Paulvo was close to taking it to. Next step now is getting some decent xlr's and going as far as I can with the balanced connections to see if that makes a difference
 
Keep in mind that the C100 is a fully balanced design so it will convert all inputs to balanced. Really the hot ticket for you would be a fully balanced CDP, etc.

FWIW, I can't tell much of an SQ difference between the C100A I had and the C200 - both are fantastic.
 
Congrats on acquiring the C100, and for an impressive looking system. Those amp pedestals are sweet!

I continue to wonder how the C100 and C200 compare to the newer dual chassis pres, the C500, C1000 and of course the newest C1100.
 
Keep in mind that the C100 is a fully balanced design so it will convert all inputs to balanced. Really the hot ticket for you would be a fully balanced CDP, etc.

FWIW, I can't tell much of an SQ difference between the C100A I had and the C200 - both are fantastic.
I run my cdp into a D100 dac. From there I was thinking I'd run xlr's into the C100 if it would make a difference.

Congrats on a fine McIntosh purchase!
Thanks I'm pretty happy with it.

Congrats on acquiring the C100, and for an impressive looking system. Those amp pedestals are sweet!

I continue to wonder how the C100 and C200 compare to the newer dual chassis pres, the C500, C1000 and of course the newest C1100.
Thanks; the amp stands were actually a pair of end tables from the flea market. I used the pedestals and made some tops the same size as the 2500's.
I've wondered how they compare to the new models to as the C100's are about 20 years old now.
 
Congrats on acquiring the C100, and for an impressive looking system. Those amp pedestals are sweet!

I continue to wonder how the C100 and C200 compare to the newer dual chassis pres, the C500, C1000 and of course the newest C1100.
Pretty significant gains in S/N with the newer units for sure. And every time I think - how significant could that be really? - I find myself surprised at the answer as it really is significant. However, the feature set of the C100 and C200 easily trumps that of the newer units when you look at connectivity. Where do I connect my RT-909 and RX-505 on a C1100?
 
Pretty significant gains in S/N with the newer units for sure. And every time I think - how significant could that be really? - I find myself surprised at the answer as it really is significant. However, the feature set of the C100 and C200 easily trumps that of the newer units when you look at connectivity. Where do I connect my RT-909 and RX-505 on a C1100?

Well according to the Berner's specs, there's not much difference in S/N. I'm only guessing since I've not heard many Mc pres, but I suspect all since the 90's have virtually silent black backgrounds. But yeah, connectivity is a whole nuther party.
 
I run my cdp into a D100 dac. From there I was thinking I'd run xlr's into the C100 if it would make a difference.

Well, you'll have to report on this and let us know. Dan has the same DAC connected to his C100 but I'm honestly not sure if he's using RCAs or XLRs. Dan?

For me, I acquired a somewhat unique Pioneer CDP of a fully balanced design in about 1995. For 20 years, I only used it's RCA outputs - heck, I didnt' even own a preamp of any kind with XLR inputs . When I got the C100, I was actually able to make use of the XLR outputs and listen to it fully balanced. Just wow.
 
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Yes yesterday was the day for me to retire my C33 to a secondary rig and give a C100 a shot, I've had it about 24 hours now and I must say I completely agree with the great reviews this awesome pre seems to get. As much as I liked my 33 (up until yesterday it was the nicest pre I've ever owned) the 100 is in a whole nuther league. The clarity and dead silent background are amazing. What really surprises me is that even crappy sources such as fm and bluetooth are now listenable. Cd's are amazing and I've already picked up on a phrase on a well known recording that wasn't understandable before the C100. I'm not too much into vinyl but I just may start listening to it after playing a couple records. This thing just seems to do everything right.

The only thing I didn't like about it though was the real estate is uses up. It took some head scratching and a while to reconfigure my rack. In the end it was well worth the extra effort and I think it fits in well with the both the newer and the older gear as well.

One other thing I've noticed is vintage Mac is really nice gear but the newer stuff really is much nicer. I just wish I could afford more of it. Thanks Leftside for a good deal on a great pre and X3workshop to for answering a lot of my questions.

Glad to hear you found a great match and performance boost.
 
Looks good in your rack! FWIW, I'm running fully balanced from an OPPO BDP105. SQ is definitely improved this way. Glad I could help answering your questions as best as I could. Enjoy!
 
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