Hi there everyone.
Was hoping I could pose the questions I asked to Dennis via ebay here as well. Been over a week or so and haven't heard back, so thought I'd solicit you all as well since it sounds like many have direct experience with many of his amps and continuing development.
Right now I'm looking to compliment a bottlehead crack headphone amp/hd580. I've got a very small space (12x13) with 2 adjoining rooms of roughly equal size on 2 of the 4 sides. Right now I have no speakers or preamps or anything other than the noted headphone amp. My plan was to feed whatever amp digital audio & flac files for now. I listen to most everything. Classic to hard rock, lots of jazz, female vocals, electronica, classical, folk, rap, everything. Value resolution over loudness, prefer moderate listening levels, like bass, but dont need / want it to shake the house. Have a bit of a preference too for a slightly laid back warm sound, which is why I guess I'm looking at a tube amp. Specifically, it's the way I've read Dennis write about his amps, talk about listening, and reading here that's drawn me to his stuff.
Given my blank slate, where should I start with his amps? SET 45? 300B?
Couple of other questions to go with the DH amp recommendation;
Given my small space and whatever amp you think might be best, what might be a few suitables speakers to look at? Been looking at Omega and Tekton at the moment to give an idea of budget as well.
Is it possible (and able to produce decent results) to run one of these amps off a digital audio player (2V max out I believe)? One of the main reasons I've been trying to reach Dennis directly is to ask about this and the possibility / necessity of adding a volume control to his amp rather than also need to get a preamp if I dont need one. If anyone's willing could you please email me his contact info to pechelman AT gmail?
Really appreciate any advice here. Thanks!