Hi Peter
I have a Hovland HP100 MC and it is a keeper



I originally had an EAR 864 together with my EAR 8L6 and thought that combo was pretty special. I the used the Hovland with the 8L6 and that was pretty good too.
I now use it with my Sirius (Gamut) and over the last few days with Firebottle Monos
The Hovland benefits from good tubes and the best so far is the GE 5751 Black plate
triple mica especially with vinyl.
A very slight disadvantage is that the MC version is really the MM with the MC7 SUT apparently permanently wired and one cannot therefore switch between MC and MM.
There are masses of inputs so a competent engineer could wire a spare pair of inputs. If I were to buy one again fat chance, I would probably go for the MM version so that I could go for my own choice of SUT and one of the now superb range of MM cartridges available (good MC cartridges are now an arm and a leg)