The amp
 

Just off the phone with my friend/dealer of The ARC/Vandersteen line. He had the new amps for an afternoon and was in awe of the performance. Transparent midrange, not quite as good as the HP-7's. Made an attractive price offer. But I do value and trust his word implicitly.

I imagine Richard would not have undertaken the effort of bringing amplifiers to market unless he felt he could create optimal synergy with his speakers to realize their full potential. Most were happy mating tube amps in general (ARC in particular) as well as pairing Ayre SS amps with his speakers and getting great results already.

I was more thinking they have that dehumidifier look. Hook up the drain hose in the back. :D

Richard
 

States that these are not full frequency amps and come with an adjustable high pass filter and are meant for use with powered sub woofer speakers, per Stereophile website.

That's a lot of coin for driving a pair of subs.

No, it's meant to drive the main speakers with the support of powered subs.

Looks
 

If you ever saw the Klienfelter designed PSE Studio1 amp and pre-amps, they were just black rectangular cases. Not lookers either!

Finally
 

Someone gets it!

Obviously meant mostly for his own line of speakers with built-in powered subwoofers like my Quatros or even the Model 5. People who lay out the money for Model 7s will buy the M7-HPA.

Exactly correct.

Ken