Glenn Croft is building amplifiers again! CroftAcoustics.co.uk

I feel a bit of an alien posting on this thread but here goes...

As I said on PFM, I owned a Series 4"PP" preamp back in the early nineties and very good it was too in sound. I DID get pee'd off with the volume contraols because this particular one mistracked badly at low levels (three o'clock on one and half three on the other for example) and I could never seem to get a satisfactory balance until the volume controls were over half way. I passed this example to a mate who had it stolen and a used replacement found by Tom (NAS) Fletcher wasn't as good sounding (dull and thick toned).

Bringing things up to date, I read about what turned out to be a fellow PFMer's experiences with this model and he got in touch and sold his sample to me

http://www.soton.ac.uk/~apm3/diyaudi...t_preamps.html

Since acquiring it, Glenn suggested I remove the yellow caps added by the previous owner, removing the resistors across the line input sockets (but not the output ones) and replacing the two huge blue supply caps for Dubilier ones of under half the capacity. The mains filter has been lobotomised if not actually removed as yet and the line stage valves have been replaced with long plate Mullards. The sound is wonderful, if not quite as clear as the newer preamps he's done.

As for the volume controls, as you can see, this era of preamp puts them at each end of the front panel - purely for styling as all the non phono wires are solid core and most run together down the left hand side of the case. Fortunately, the two pots fitted (500K ones it seems, not 1Meg as suggested) track quite well on this sample. By the way, no elastic band I've tried causes the two pots to move at the same rate! They ARE a pain to use, but if they are alongside each other, then I suspect it won't be a problem for most enthusiasts. I suggested the use of separate controls is more to do with component values and availabilty rather than a real problem with stereo controls per se. I mean the latest Alps pots (and I believe Noble too) have excellent low level tracking and are quite benign in performance I think....

What you lot have totally missed IMO is that NOONE has any qualms about the expected performance of these new products, nor the proposed prices. The ONLY comments made have been about the use of two volume controls! Not bad at all for a little manufacturer is it?

Some nice info there, Dave :)

It's interesting to see how the design has evolved over the years. There's just something so 'right' about Croft amps - they seem to get on with the job of reproducing music without fuss or fanfare, and most importantly, impose little of their own character on the music.

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What you lot have totally missed IMO is that NOONE has any qualms about the expected performance of these new products, nor the proposed prices. The ONLY comments made have been about the use of two volume controls! Not bad at all for a little manufacturer is it?

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Of course not, but come on, some of the comments I've read on PFM about wives supposedly having a hissy fit at the prospect of having two knobs to twiddle (lol), as I've highlighted, are bloody ridiculous.

Marco.

Even 'ye olde' stuff seems to be still popular! :)

Look: http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.d...MEWA:IT&ih=009

Plenty of bids there.

Yep, and I just love the 'made during a spare 5 mins in the metalwork class' look. Retro is just *SO* cool!

And I bet it still spanks the pants off of quite a few modern designs.

Marco.

I've used the same casework and knobs from Maplins myself:) All good stuff inside I'm sure!

The interior of these early ones was just as well made as the later stuff. A few of us in our dealership took advantage of a nearby Croft dealer and bought some items over the years and of course we took the lids off and admired the point to point wiring etc inside.

Great stuf, great man - and I'll forgive him the last non-regulated OTL I bought that blew line fuses with no warning and if not checked with a meter every half hour, you had a firework display inside.....

Are you sure that wasn't one of Amar's 'modded' (and I use that term in the loosest possible sense) amps?

Marco.

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Of course not, but c[ome on, some of the comments I've read on PFM about wives supposedly having a hissy fit at the prospect of having two knobs to twiddle (lol), as I've highlighted, are bloody ridiculous.

Marco.

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Why? do you not think about the other people who may use the system when you are purchasing. I am looking around for a pre amp at the moment and one of these Crofts would probably have fitted the slot perfectly. NOT when you have to fark about with two volume controls every time you change source. My family have accepted valve amps as part of life from time to time, and the lack of a remote is neither here nor there, but given the level of components available I just do not see how or why you have to have two controls when one will do the same job. In the course of an evenings listening it is not unusual for all the sources to be used, and changed album by album, and to have to change two volumes, and hopefully balance them each time is to me geekery for the sake of it. I may not fit the profile of the average user of the forum, but I prefer a system that produces music, with a logical, and intuative control grouping.

If the designer/manufacturer is convinced that he is going down the only route that is acceptable to him, then that is his choice, but he is shutting the door on a lot of potential sales. It could be that he is not bothered about the loss of sales, and assumes that he will have enough work from people who will accept his choice.

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Why? do you not think about the other people who may use the system when you are purchasing.

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Of course I do, Colin. Did you not read my post where I used an example of my wife buying a new cooker or washing machine and compared this to me buying a new preamp (with twin volume controls)? If not I'd scroll back and read it (page 5 post #41). Specifically this bit:

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The thing that I mainly find ridiculous though apart from the fact that someone would be daft enough to forgo owning a superb sounding preamp for the sake of its volume control arrangement is that people's wife’s are apparently so concerned about this issue. Surely there has to be some 'come and go' and mutual understanding in a relationship?

I mean, if Del wants a new cooker or washing machine she picks what she wants and decides on the relevant facilities of the products she's buying because it's mainly her who will be using them. However on the occasions where I use those items (and it is fairly regularly) I wouldn't kick up a fuss if I had to press two more knobs on the cooker to heat up my pasta or on the washing machine to spin-dry my jeans! Of far more importance is that the new cooker and washing machine are more efficient and do their job better. Similarly, I wouldn't expect her to kick up a fuss if I bought a new preamp that used twin volume control knobs that was obviously far superior to what I had before - she would just get used to it as I would get used to using the new cooker or washing machine...

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I don't really see how that can sensibly be argued.

Other than that you make some valid points :)

What I would ask you is, say, if after hearing the Croft and being absolutely blown away by it, and it totally outperforming every other preamp on your audition list, would you then still not purchase it because of the twin volume controls?

I know for a fact though that regardless of what people think on forums here or elsewhere, Glenn will have work coming out of his ears when he gets going :smoking:

Marco.

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Originally Posted by Marco

Are you sure that wasn't one of Amar's 'modded' (and I use that term in the loosest possible sense) amps?

Marco.

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This was in the days before Amar and Glenn subsquently went over to regulated power supplies, which I'm sure cured the problems I had with mine. The internal build was absolutely amazing - very simple wiring from point to point..

I haven't had a chance to hear a good OTL design, but I would like to. The Berning has a bit of a rep but I've not heard one. I seem to remember Merlin going rather 'ape' about it.

Fingers crossed, I should get a chance tomorrow to write a piece on the modifications Glenn has carried out to my Charisma-X :)

Marco.