Mister Pig
Pigamus Maximus
Traded emails with David Belles the other day, my amp is built and on the bench burning in. Said it was going to be there for a week, and then get shipped off. That means it ships later this week! The bummer is that it comes from across the country, so it is 7 or 8 days of shipping time.....piggies are not known for their patience.
From the bit of browsing I have done, I discovered that David has been plying his trade of soldering capacitor, resistor, and transformer for over 35 years. Never have I read a bad word about Belles products, and they seem to be well liked in all quarters. I found reference to a Stereophile article that put the Belles 150 Hot Rod in the top 100 influential amplifiers of all time.
Looking at the topology of the amp, there is nothing super cool about it. Three gain stages, JFET on the front, then bipolar transistors for the second, and mosfet outputs...but what is the Belles site lists the outputs as biased to Class B. But as I understood this is a Class A/B amp. Power output is 125 WPC into 8 ohms, and 250 into 4 ohms. Frequency bandwidth is wide at .2HZ to 70Khz, S to N ratio of over 100dB, and dampening factor over 1000, and capable of 30+ amperes of current swing.
So it is a very conventional amplifier, yet the skill of the designer really comes into play here. I used to own a Rowland Model 5 which was a Class AB amp that sounded every bit as good as any tube amp I owned, despite its pedestrian topology. Every description I have heard of the Belle amps are they are transparent, even in tonal balance, lacking in any dryness or grain in the upper registers, and capable of detailed shades of dynamic contrast.
So we will see how this all turns out. In the back of my mind, if the Belle turns out to be that kind of amp that curls my tail, I will keep the 150 for a year, adn then take the plunge for the SA-100 from the Statement series. I have heard certain folks say that amp is able to keep up with some very elite amplifiers. Hopefully in a couple of weeks I will be able to take measure of this amp.
Regards
Mister Pig
From the bit of browsing I have done, I discovered that David has been plying his trade of soldering capacitor, resistor, and transformer for over 35 years. Never have I read a bad word about Belles products, and they seem to be well liked in all quarters. I found reference to a Stereophile article that put the Belles 150 Hot Rod in the top 100 influential amplifiers of all time.
Looking at the topology of the amp, there is nothing super cool about it. Three gain stages, JFET on the front, then bipolar transistors for the second, and mosfet outputs...but what is the Belles site lists the outputs as biased to Class B. But as I understood this is a Class A/B amp. Power output is 125 WPC into 8 ohms, and 250 into 4 ohms. Frequency bandwidth is wide at .2HZ to 70Khz, S to N ratio of over 100dB, and dampening factor over 1000, and capable of 30+ amperes of current swing.
So it is a very conventional amplifier, yet the skill of the designer really comes into play here. I used to own a Rowland Model 5 which was a Class AB amp that sounded every bit as good as any tube amp I owned, despite its pedestrian topology. Every description I have heard of the Belle amps are they are transparent, even in tonal balance, lacking in any dryness or grain in the upper registers, and capable of detailed shades of dynamic contrast.
So we will see how this all turns out. In the back of my mind, if the Belle turns out to be that kind of amp that curls my tail, I will keep the 150 for a year, adn then take the plunge for the SA-100 from the Statement series. I have heard certain folks say that amp is able to keep up with some very elite amplifiers. Hopefully in a couple of weeks I will be able to take measure of this amp.
Regards
Mister Pig
