Richard, I am not sure where to start. I have had the Baby Amp for about 48 hours playing non stop.

My system consists of the following.

Cary 306/200 CD player

Cary 98P Pre amp

Cary 805c Power amps

Coincident Victory Loudspeakers

Interconnect and speaker cable are Empirical silver

The CD player and pre amp are being powered by a PS Audio P300

I called Sophia Electric to buy a pair of 300b mesh plate tubes so I wouldn’t use up my coveted Western Electric 300b tubes. After receiving the Sophia Electric tubes I quickly realized that this tube is every bit as musical and magical as the WE at fraction the cost. I will be buying a back up before Richard and the fine people at Sophia Electric realize that they could charge more.

Back to the reason for this review, during my conversation with Richard, he suggested that I try his new Baby Amp. I ordered one with return policy. About a week and half later the amp shows up at my door step. Upon opening the box I came to a first impression, how could an amp of this size be considered "High End". Plugging the amp in, my suspicions were immediately confirmed, it just was not up to the task. I didn’t have the amp plugged in for an hour when my phone rings and it is Richard from Sophia Electric, how he knew the amp had arrived just an hour earlier I have no idea. He tells me just leave it on for 24 hours non stop before I judge it. I knew this having had Cary for so many years which take forever to break in. He also told me to take my pre amp out of the loop and run the CD player directly into the amp. That next afternoon I again sat down and took a listen. A total transformation from a very thin sounding amp with virtually no sound stage to one that has extreme extended highs without being to bright. A very full base again without being boomy. The sound stage became three dimensional. Ren’ee Fleming’s voice "The Beautiful Voice" was front and center, well ahead of the orchestra. The orchestra filled up the whole back wall with a very full sound. I continually had to remind myself that this was an $800.00 integrated amp I was listening to. A Cary 805c it is not, but, at less than 10 times the cost of a pair of Cary’s, it delivers 90%+ the performance.

This amp is totally user friendly, one just needs to plug the tubes in and play, no biasing needed. One who is considering getting his/her first tube amp but is intimidated by the thought of biasing and the general up keep that goes along with many other tube amps not to mention the cost of the replacement tubes, this amp is for you. Richard tells me re-tubing the Baby Amp costs just over $60.00 dollars. In today’s world one can spend multiples of that for just one tube for other amps. In my opinion this amp deserves to be considered "High End".

Bob Jones