The Insight preamp has even more of the transparency, dynamic range, linearity and pure music for which Audio by Van Alstine has become known. Listen to all of your recordings again and find all of the space, all of the sounds of the instruments that you’d overlooked before.

Because we use a combination of integrated and hybrid ICs to achieve our musical goals, the cost is much less than you would expect. Of course we use metal-film resistors, selected film capacitors, precision controls, gold jacks, and high-reliability active devices. However, parts alone don’t make the product—it is the use of the parts that determines overall quality. We don’t get silly about expensive frills that do nothing to improve the musicality or usefulness of the product. Great audio design doesn’t have to be expensive, only great.

The Insight preamp has even more of the transparency, dynamic range, linearity and pure music for which Audio by Van Alstine has become known. Listen to all of your recordings again and find all of the space, all of the sounds of the instruments that you’d overlooked before.

Because we use a combination of integrated and hybrid ICs to achieve our musical goals, the cost is much less than you would expect. Of course we use metal-film resistors, selected film capacitors, precision controls, gold jacks, and high-reliability active devices. However, parts alone don’t make the product—it is the use of the parts that determines overall quality. We don’t get silly about expensive frills that do nothing to improve the musicality or usefulness of the product. Great audio design doesn’t have to be expensive, only great.

It also has high reliability gold contact pushbutton switches for the front panel functions.

Working from what we had already done so well, my vacuum tube specialist, Dean Kayser, has developed a fresh approach to vacuum tube design. With a huge, open, transparent, and simply lovable sound, the Transcendence Eight will get your attention because it is so faithful to the spirit of the music. We build vacuum tube products because the very high voltage overload capability of a small signal tube, properly used, yields musical performance—especially in the midrange—that is so natural and relaxing that many purists demand it. Some of us suspect that part of what we like about vacuum tube sound might really be a bit of euphonic coloration. But the tube lover wants what a great tube design provides, and the Transcendence Eight makes life (and the music) easy for the vacuum tube lover. The price is nearly an order of magnitude lower than its audio salon-priced competition and the performance is great. If you want to hear what tube sound is all about, this is your best opportunity.

We started with our basic patented design ideas that have worked so well, and provided even better power supply isolation between tube sections and mos-fet section with a much higher capability MOSFET buffer/driver circuit, all running Class A, and came out with simply astonishing results; the new Ultra SL preamplifier.

The Ultra SL preamp tells us that simpler is best if you can make it work to perfection, and we have. Our famous patented Fet Valve transimpedance gain cell just loves the high current drive of the 6N1P line tube and the much higher current gain of our power MOSFET design in the loop isolator circuit. The circuit simply comes alive with pure musicality, dynamic range, transient attacks, and range extension we had not thought possible.