alexchong8

Overall Rating
 1 of 5

Value Rating
 1 of 5

Used product for
More than 1 year

Visitors rate this review
5.00 of 5, 1.00 votes

Price Paid:  $1500.00 from alpha audio s'pore

Summary:
Strong midrange but loosy bass.

Reliability is poor. After warranty expired, my set kaput. Agent took ages to repair and revert. Finally they could not repair it loccaly as they claimed board spilt. Cost more to re-order a new board and now I have to write off. Hence my advice to everyone, please steer away from this brand!!

Price Paid:  $750.00 from ALPHA SINGAPORE

Summary:
This amp sounds powerful, natural and musical. Good responsive remote and attractive build and features. But unfortunately the amp has reliability problem where it faced technical glitch after being using less than two years.

rmihai

Overall Rating
 5 of 5

Value Rating
 5 of 5

Used product for
3 Months to 1 year

Visitors rate this review
4.20 of 5, 5.00 votes

Price Paid:  $1795.00 from Local dealer

Summary:
I am sorry, but I will have to disagree with Dejan (from TNT). Thule IA 60B is by far the best amplifier that I tried in a bunch. I use to be a bass guitar player in a progressive rock band. For many many years. I know very well how the live performances sounds and the studio recordings. I know my stuff in amplification and speakers. I never tought that I will so difficult to find a "home" amplifier that is at the same level. And it was very difficult. Let me tell you what I tried before stopping to Thule IA 60B: - EXPOSURE 2010 - REGA Mira 3 - AUDREAL Duo 1.0 - AUDION Sterling EL 34 - ARCAM Diva A80 - CR DEVELOPMENTS Kalypso - ROKSAN Kandy KA1 & Caspian - CAIRN PM100 & AM100, Kairn - TALISMAN T35HP T54A - AUDIO REFINEMENT Well, from the shelf, Thule IA 60 B bettered all this amplifiers. Why? Because it sounds RIGHT. And because is the only one that I found to be NATURAL and TRANSPARENT. Indeed, Dejan is partially right - the BASS of this amplifier is absolutelly OUTSTANDING!!! And indeed, before modding it, the bass use to cover somehow the rest of the spectrum. After I modded it, changing caps with Blackgates and replacing the feds with Hyper-Feds, the reoult is marvelous. Well done Danemark!!! I dare to say this is the best amplifier that money can buy up to $1800 (you have to agree that I tried some of the most respected amplifiers before stopping to this). Well right now I am enjoying listening to it. And if you can find one on the used market, don't look around - you know what you will have to do.

Similar Products Used:
- EXPOSURE 2010 - REGA Mira 3 - AUDREAL Duo 1.0 - AUDION Sterling EL 34 - ARCAM Diva A80 - CR DEVELOPMENTS Kalypso - ROKSAN Kandy KA1 & Caspian - CAIRN PM100 & AM100, Kairn - TALISMAN T35HP T54A - AUDIO REFINEMENT

Belgarchi

Overall Rating
 4 of 5

Value Rating
 4 of 5

Used product for
1 to 3 months

Visitors rate this review
4.50 of 5, 2.00 votes

Price Paid:  $575.00 from Audiogon

Summary:
This Thule IA60B SE has a very strong personality. It has a powerful power supply (30,000 microFarads !), a great digital potentiometer, a very heavy case, is genuinely balanced, and has a superb toroidal transformer, RCA and XLR connectors. But its remote control is flimsy, it has only 2 buttons on the front face (0n/off, source selection), and it uses many opamps. The sound is special too : I disliked it during the first half hour, but I quickly recognized that it is very detailed without agressivity, has a very low noise floor, and stays excellent at low volume (rare). At high volume, it is distording, but I think that it is due to my old B&W DM12 speakers and to the cable (16 ga 35 ft ! I MUST replace them) It won a "Best Buy" tag from Hi-Fi Choice.

Strengths:
Digital volume control, Balanced configuration, Sound very special (excellent)

Weaknesses:
Price ($1700 new !), flimsy R.C., no headphone out, no Phono input, many commands on R.C. only

Similar Products Used:
Teac, Rotel, Sansui, Denon, Arcam, NAD

Summary:
I compared all the above mentioned amplifiers, and each had their strenths ans weaknesses. I finally chose the Thule, since it was the one that gave me most detail and 3D soundstage for the money. It's a bit hard to explain, but I felt that the other amps either contributed or took something from the original sound of the CD. In other words, it was the most neutral of the bunch, and the one that let the signal pass throug without altering it.
It also sounded bigger/beefier than the 2x60W would suggest. The bas is very well controlled and goes very deep, the midrange is detailed and a bit warm sounding, and the trebble is very detailed and seems to be reaching higher frequencies than the others.
The downside to this level of detail, is that your badly recorded CD's sound excactly like what they are - badly recorded CD's. Also, you should make sure you have a good quality source (preferably with XLR ouputs), since a cheap/bad cd-player will be revealed as beeing just that.

When choosing speakers to go with the Thule, make sure they're not too bright sounding or with an agressive midrange/trebble. Otherwise it will sound too bright and analytical.

This might sound as if the Thule is very thin and brigt sounding. It's not, it's really just very agile and precise - at all fequencies.
Therefor, it's not one of those amps you would use for casual background music, since it's way too involving for that.

If you have a system that's sounding a bit dull, this amp will bring it to life. If you like lots of detail and a big 3D soundstage, this amp might be it. But if you allready have bright sounding speakers and ditto CD-player, the combination might be too much.

Overall - Highly recommended!

Strengths:
Transparent and VERY detailed sound, powerfull (for it's size), construcion quality, design

Weaknesses:
Can be a bit on the bright side, and some find it too analytical. The non-balanced inputs sounds a bit less detailed than the XLR input

Similar Products Used:
Denon PMA2000R, NAD 319, Densen DM10, Arcam Alpha 9, Audiolab 8000S, Rotel RA 980BX