Tube Maze

5 Stars4 Stars3 Stars2 Stars1 Star (2 votes, average: 5.00 out of 5)

Let’s get the unpleasant part out of the way first: the New York Audio Labs Moscode 600 is not a pretty amplifier. It looks like something bolted into a 1980s broadcast truck, or standing guard in the boiler room of a Brooklyn walk-up. A perforated metal cage hides the tubes, a fan hums along whether you need it or not, and the whole thing has the industrial charm of a toaster oven designed by a committee of electricians. If you buy hi-fi to impress the neighbors, keep walking. If you buy it to be moved by music, pull up a chair, because that ugly cage is hiding something beautiful.

5 Stars4 Stars3 Stars2 Stars1 Star (1 votes, average: 4.00 out of 5)

When an amplifier arrives on my bench with one channel’s fuses not blown but gone, I don’t reach for music. I reach for the variac, the dim-bulb tester and a strong cup of coffee. A missing fuse is the audio equivalent of a used car with black tape over the check-engine light. Somebody knew something and decided you didn’t need to. So before I tell you how the Bedini 150/150 Mk II sounds, let me tell you that it very nearly didn’t get the chance.

5 Stars4 Stars3 Stars2 Stars1 Star (3 votes, average: 4.67 out of 5)

When I reviewed the Moscode 150, I closed by advising owners of power-hungry speakers to look at the bigger Moscode 300. Then I went and bought one. That is the occupational hazard of giving advice: sooner or later you hear yourself.

5 Stars4 Stars3 Stars2 Stars1 Star (4 votes, average: 4.50 out of 5)

I did not need another integrated amplifier. Nobody who owns more than three amplifiers needs another one. That’s not how this hobby works, and anyone who tells you otherwise is either lying or married to someone with veto power. But the Sansui AU-11000 has a way of getting past your defenses. It sits there, black-faced and 42 pounds, wearing enough knobs and levers to dock a space capsule, and it dares you not to plug it in.