el`Ol wrote:

Here is the link: http://www.rank-concept.de I have no experience with the Lamm ML-series, I just listened to an M-series hybrid amp combined with the Watt/Puppy 8. This performance was a single fake (though a pleasant one). I can´t say where was the fault, because this was also my only experience with Wilson.

The Lamm M1.1 was extremely interesting amp in fact I consider it the absolutely best buy with its $6K price range (used). It has many problems at First and Second Levels of listening perception (look for the thered “How to evaluate playback...”) but it has very interesting ability to “move target within the shooting range” (if you know what I mean). This quietly is superbly important and BTW disability to “move target” is one of the biggest Lamm ML2 shortcoming. I do not know what exactly you did not like in M1.1. The Watt/Puppy 8 are extremely horrible speakers. If you intend to run M1.1 with small Wilsons then try Watt/Puppy 5.3 with a few layers of toilet paper across the tweeters and properly positioned (superbly important). Any other small Wilson should be cut for firing wood.

Romy the Cat wrote:

Because GM70 can work in A2 class the ML3 has a very powerful high current-capable second stage (I do not know it they are 4 parallel 6H30 of some kind of composite follower) to be able to handle the GM70’s grid current.

http://blog.stereophile.com/fsi2008/040708lamm/

“The ML3 Signature runs a single Russian GM70 directly heated output tube (introduced in 1948, the year I was born) with 1200V on the plate to give 28 watts into 8 ohms. The GM70 is driven by four paralleled 6N30P "Super Tubes," with a single 12AX7 as the input stage. The choke-smoothed power supply in a separate chassis uses four 12AX3 diode tubes as a bridge rectifier to derive the high-voltage rail for the output tube, with another two 12AX3 tubes supplying DC to the front-end tubes.”

Ok, now we know the true voltage on the GM70’s plate.  My initial presumption was that Lamm drives GM70 at low voltage and needs 4 tubes in the driver stage to gel with grid current in class A2. If John Atkinson is correct and Lamm LM3’s GM70 sits at 1200V then it will hardly ever go into A2 and the amp should have around 35, though Lamm was always very conservative with his power rating. The only question remains open is way he needed to pile up 4 parallel capacitance coupled tubes if he uses 1200V in the output’s anode. The first stage in ML3 is lifted on feedback, like in ML2.  The second stage would not swing close AC voltage to approach the GM70’ grid (at 1200V in plate is will be let say minus 200V). So why Lamm need the current build up in the driver stage? Go figure…

Romy the Cat wrote:

Marc Mickelson had an “honor” to make my site in past:  http://www.goodsoundclub.com/TreeItem.aspx?PostID=760  http://www.goodsoundclub.com/TreeItem.aspx?PostID=2773  Marc is the “gear of the machinery” and he is instrumental entity to sell amps. Probably the stage is being set for Mr. Mickelson to begin the cheerleading the new Lamm’s amplifiers….

This thread that stared as mockery of Vladimir Lamm and Lamm Industry got turned into talks about ML3 amp. I was thinking to split the thread but then decided to keep it as it as they might be much related subjects.

Lamm announced that his new ML3 amps will be reviewed by Marc Mickelson with Wilson Audio X-2 Alexandria  - Oh who could guess it? Marc Mickelson has a history of publicizing Lamm’s products, so it sound like a logical chose. There is not a lot of know about the ML3. There is a guy on Audiogon “Oneobgyn” who uses ML3 and who drools over himself about his love to this amp. Interesting that after using the amp for a while he has absolutely nothing to say about the amp’s sound besides encouraging others and himself to buy the amp – the typical Audiogon idiot as I can see it.

Now, Marc Mickelson will enter the game a month or two. If you are familiar Mickelson’s produce and know the rules of the reviewing engagements then with you have already read 95% of the Mickelson’s upcoming review. I have no doubts that the review will be stupid and What Marc doe now is collecting adjectives to ornament his writing and make it to feel different. Conceptually however it will be a zerox-copy of any other “critical acclaims” that Mark and the Morons in his business did in a past.

Mark Mickelson reviewed Lamm L1 prams and then L2 Lamm preamp - Mark Mickelson filed to recognize some dangers and alarming tendencies in L2. Anyhow, we should not be very hard on Mark Mickelson – he got paid not for the brain he used in his writing but for the amount of exuberant saliva he spits while he is worshiping a new product.  Still, I found that it is very good that Mark Mickelson dealt with Lamm L2. Sometime ago the boys that infested around the Soundstage and who are in the business to trade on used market the Soundstage-extorted audio components were running around selling the Mark Mickelson’s  personals Lamm L2 preamp that he got after his review. I took it as a very good sight of the fact the Lamm L3 preamp is coming – it might a very interesting machine and I am very enthusiastic about it.

Then Mark Mickelson, afar a years of having ML2.0 power amp reviewed the ML2.1 amps. The ML2.1 were fucking Krell or Parasound in Lamm enclosure but Mark Mickelson keep trumpeting and drumming the “glory of Lamm sound” without having any sense what the hell going on. Now he was given the ML3 and said “Fetch” - I wonder what he will come up with. There is an interesting moment in it. It looks like before the Mickelson’s review of ML3 it will be coming the Mickelson’s review of Lamm LP2 phonostage, the devilishly-broken one:

It will be interesting for the sake of Mark Mickelson’s credibility to see what he will be able to say about LP2 phonostage and then to reflect his “thoughts” about ML3 in context of the sensibility he might use about LP2. Well, we all will be watching…

Romy the Cat wrote:

Ok, let dive a little bit further into my examination of the subject of Lamm ML3 What is important is to undusted that my view  less targets the Lamm ML3 but rather it targets the ML3 as a representative of entire class of amplifiers. When I told that Lamm ML3 is “fundamentally improper design” I did not mean to critique the ML3 specifically but rather the entire family of expensive Single-Ended amplifiers where the “cost became to be a major design impediment”. I will try to explain it further. People who have brain understand that everything in audio is learning experience and I would like to describe why I feel that “expensive SET” dose not comply with my vision of a “correct direction”. It is juts my opinion and it based on my own experience. Your mileage might wary but where did you see me to care about your mileage? Anyhow, I have my opineon and I agree with it, so it comes… For beginning I would like to observe a SET amplifier as a progression of quality and price, in this case prices will be very much an applied tool. We all know that SET is very simple amplifier: usually 2-3 stages, few parts, short paths etc… Let pretend that price DOES have direct relationship to the quality of amplifier (or sound), in fact why shouldn’t it?  In today world a simple OK-performing SET made around “simple” 2A3, 45, 6C33C or 300B cost under $1000. There a number of Chinese companies that do chips SETs (under $500), AN does their 300B set for under $600 I believe, there are a number of American companies who do very inexpensive sets (Bottlehead, AudioMirror and many others). The all sound better or worth but they in fact closer to “better sound” (with an adequate load) then many $20.000-$60.000  solid-state monsters build by Morons with diplomas of electricians (a long list of the companies goes here). Do these $1000 SETs sound as good as SET could? Of course not – there is a quite a room for Sound from here. Now we begin to add price/expense and we will have a more or less proportional growth of quality (if the designer knows what he does). The specials case when people employ phony “expensive solution”, like use of 0.001 precision resistirs, gold transforms, or the chassis made form Agarwood with platinum bumper around the amplifier I will leave out of scope, as those actions have no relation to Audio.  So, regardless of the topology if your SET has more properly used chokes, better transformers, better power supplies, better amps design, better assembling techniques, better drivers (very critical), better protection and control, better tubes and many other factors then the amps could add quality and price. Still, any SET is basically is 2-3 dozens of parts and soon or later, regardless what you do you reach a “price threshold” where better parts, better supplies, better assembling techniques, better tubes do not add anything anymore within any MEANINGFUL scale. My estimate, based upon my experiences, that a self-cost of a pair of SET monoblocks at hits the “price threshold” level would be around $4000-$5000 for the amps that use low voltage output tubes and $7000-$8000 for amps that use high voltage transmission tubes. From here there is only one way to add quality and consequentially price to your SET – to improve further the only thing that maters in SETs: the output transformer (OPT). The OPT is the main bitch of any SET and in the same time it is a subject of glory of any SET.  Something very positive happens to Sound when goes through transformer, the key is that the transformer should be good and it arguably should be the only transformer in a unit. So, the OPT: the frequency response, articulation, dynamic, tone, inner-tonal connectively, balance between “resolution” and “space” and  whatever else you might value in Sound came in it’s majority from the quality of OPT of SET. A person whose amps is at the “thresholds prices level” from here might jump into all imaginable OPT exotica, chasing in Sound whatever he fells needs to be chaise. A good OPT might cost a few thousand dollars it is all depends of the budget and the intentions/expertise/experiences of the person who design and who makes and who build the transformer. However, regardless how fantastic SET transformer would be it still hit its own topological limitations. To get bass you need inductance. I’m not necessary taking about better number of bass but rather about bass as quality. The OPT do not just need inductance to do bass but the inductance as “something else”. You can increase the core size as much as you wish to pay, building up inductance but inductance kills HF. It would be simple if the inductance kills juts HF numbers (there are ways to fight it) but the inductance kills HF “quietly”. Higher frequencies are opposite: they heed fewer turns and lower inductance…. So, people got into many different more or less sophisticating techniques (complicated core materials, tricky sectioning, intricate winding techniques and many others) to get out of SET’s OPT proper reproduction of boundaries. When people go into the high voltage tubes the situation become even more complicated as high voltage requires more isolation between the turns, which increases space within winding that builds up parasitic capacitance. Those capacitances dehydrate HF’s transients. When people listen all of those high voltage amplifiers with the “big tubes” they report “Big Sound”. (I call it the “Elephant Sound” – search my site I have written about it before). However, a nature or this “Big Sound” is dehydration of HF. Take any speaker, increase its tweeter output for a 3db and then place in front of the tweeter a soft hairy fabrics that would eat this 3db up. Now you will have a mimic of that  “Elephant Sound” – that in fact is not the “Big Sound” but rather a sound with unevenness of subjective transients across the range (MF are “faster” then HF). So, retuning back to the transformer – it is very complicated to do the OPT transformer for any more or less mindful full range, that would presumably also sound properly. Very few people out there know how it might be done. Very view can actually implement it if they even told how it might be done and very few, if any, go for a recursive subjective assessment using PROPER LISTENING TECHNIQUES of achieved results when they build transformers. Still, making even a theoretically perfect transformer for a given SET any person hits the dead wall of the fundamental bandwidth limitations for OPT and it is imposable to fight them while keeping the aim to the exoteric properties of sound in the same time. Russians have a good old fairytale about a village person who caught a fox and decided to make a soup with it. He put the fox onto a pot but the tail was sticking out. He pushed the tail into the pot but the fox’s head moved out of the pot. He pushed the head in the pot but the tail went out…. The very same with OPT and people cook their foxes disregarding the fact that heads and tails in OPT are improperly cooked…. I have heard many SETs and all of them had issues with wide bandwidth, it is not that they did not have bass or did not have HF but when they try to get it something else turned to go wrong. The only one wide-bandwidth-interesting amp that I’m familiar with was Lamm ML2 (old production not the ML2.1). It is not perfect SET from the perspective of “as good as it could be” but it is “better then anything else that I heard”. The ML2 was the only amp that was trying to do HF and LF (still with it limitations as I learned eventually) and do not go apart in anything else at the same time. So, a cogent reader would ask: “Romy, if Lamm was capable to design the ML2’s OPT and get the result the he got with that amps then why you feel that he might not do the same good job with ML3?” It is an excellent questing and I have two answers: first is the Lamm’s attitude and second is the “fundamental design flaw of ML3”. FIRST: THE LAMM’S ATTITUDE.  Lamm might do the OPT as good as the ML2 was but also there is nothing that prevents Vladimir to design the ML3 transformer in the way how he designed the ML2.1 transformer. Considering that GM70 transformer is many times more complicated and more expensive then 6C33C the question would be: where Vladimir would say “it is enough for them”. I have no doubts about Vladimir’s capacity to do interesting things but I have quite uninspiring knowledge about his decision making pattern. I would like do not go personally into the subject but stay “outside” and use only the publicly available facts. So, was the ML2.1 transformer “good enough for them”? Defiantly it was: the amplifier had glorious reviews, being sold nicely and generally considered a success model. It is ironic, that the very same person who brought to us that miserable “ML2.1 sound” (reportedly because of the “better” transformer) tries to impress to us the “ML3 sound”. You see where I am coming from? It is too simplistic to see that I appointed Lamm as my person bitch on my site but the realty is way different if to look at the fact. The facts are facts and the LP2, ML2.1 and L2 that came from Vladimir AFTER Vladimir made M1.1, L1 and ML2 are the facts and their performances are self-evident. If a person is an idiot and do not know better (many audio manufacturers) then they juts idiots. The problem is that Lamm is not an idiot and he knows better. Therefore the question with Lamm actions would be: will Lamm, as a commercial products maker, willing to do better? I do not know the answer and what I am observing later regarding Lamm makes me suspicious. I personally very much understand the Lamm’s attitude: “It is it good enough for them”. Sure it is. If I were a manufacturer then (considering my respect to the audio Morons out there) I would take it even further them Lamm does and I would make my amplifiers to explode like a bomb and to kill those “listeners”. Still, I am not a manufacture but a person who is critical about the fact of audio performance –all the rest is secondary. In the end,  the ML3 will be as good as Lamm’s attitude would alow it to be, however the Sound of ML3 will be still absolutely and unarguably limited by the “fundamental design flaw of ML3” SECOND: “FUNDAMENTALLY IMPROPER DESIGN OF ML3” Here we go, here is the very major and the most important part in the entire article and I would return you attention back to the subject of price as an applied tool of SET design. Pretend you have a perfect SET. Let presume that word “perfect” implies the unlimited amount of money, unlimited amount of design skills and unlimited amount of knowledge about the nature of sound and audio (very critical) that were used for implementation of that perfect SET. Since a complexity of SET is limited by its default simplistic topology you puff up that perfect SET with I would say $8000 worth of implementations. (we are still under presumption that prices = quality). Then you do crazy and designed an amazing OPT. Let presume that it is high voltage tube and you went for as high as $5000 for a transformer. Right now you have a stunning, full range SET. Let presume that this SET would be your Lamm ML3 for $125K, or AN for $165K or Wavac for $350K. So, you have a very good amp that cost you a LOT of money, a LOT of affords, years and years of learning about Sound and that your Perfect SET is able to address the most demanding requirements existing in audio reproduction and the most demanding your demands. Now, who would use that Perfect SET? Now we hit a very interning point. Are we taking about juts an expensive piece of electronics that the short-penis boys buy in order to feel better or we are taking about the “most demanding requirements existing in audio reproduction”? If we are talking about using that “Perfect SET” to address some really demanding requirements then I am sure it won’t be a person who will be plugging that “Perfect SET” into a 30” tall single-driver mini monitor. It is most likely (not to say mandatory), that the person who can reach in his level of audio development the state of the “Perfect SET” would use as evolved rest of the system: the persons’ acoustic system will be as evolved as the “Perfect SET” is. It is my strong and firm conviction that any sound that worth more then a thousand dollars should come from a multi-channel installation where 4-5-6 channels produce sound within partial frequency range. It is complex, it is expensive, it is large, it requires a lot of efforts to make it sound PROPERLY (now a lot of people ever witnesses properly made and instated large multi-channel) but when it done as it should be then it capable to operate at the very same level as the “Perfect SET” - addressing the “most demanding requirements existing in audio reproduction”. Here is where the fundamental design flows of any “Perfect SET” (including the Lamm ML3) demonstrate its limitation in full glory: A SINGLE MORE OR LESS FULL RANGE SET AS NOT A DESIRABLE AMPLIFICATION TO DRIVE ANY SERIOUS MULTI-CHANNEL INSTALLATION. Any single person who ever went for a PROPERLY IMPLEMENTED bi-amping and line-level crossovering never looked back, ever. An ability to writhe a perfect crossover curve with a perfectly predictable phase characteristic at the line-level is not imaginable at speakers level where impedance is “free running” (any attempts to lock impedance fuck-up sound, it is well know to any people who have ears). Furthermore, the amassing ability to manage damping for each channels, mange harmonics for each channel matching the EXECT need of the driver (by loading each output tubes differently) and at many-many-many other factors  set any properly done multi-amping of  multi-channel  acoustic system very far apart form anything else. Now, tell me: what the hell a person with a capable multi-channel acoustic system would do with a single “Perfect SET”? The person system but its nature of being multi-channeled implies that it wants the best amplification within each channel. However, we have juts one SET, the one that was built like the cooking that fox on the pot with OTP the no mater what you do is juts compromise. I any “Perfect SET” 70% of its cost and efforts dedicated to be wide bandwidth… despite that any more or less serious multi-channel  speaker requires…. narrow bandwidth for each channel. So, here is a clear waste of 70% cost and efforts in your use your “Perfect SET”. A responsible question would be: why do not use 2 or 3 of that Lamm ML3 to driver a “better” acoustic system? Let again disregard the price, but even then, we might find that an amplifier like Lamm ML3 suddenly become as not attractive candidate for the task of milti-amping. What we need in order to peruse the “most demanding requirements existing in audio reproduction” would be different. We need a LF SET (it might be the very same Vladimir’s ML3) only with huge output transformer’s core mass and having very-very high inductance (many times more then Lamm has in his ML3), with huge among of capacitance in PS, with very precise ability to dial-in the tube’s loading, with as low output impedance as possible and with as much power as possible to get out the given tube (even switching in the end into A2). However, for HF we need absolutely opposite: low inductance and low capacitance in OPT, minimum amount of turns, sensitive “able to react” power supply with near minimal capacitance but large amount of inductance, capable for fast acceleration transformer core,  heavier tube loading, limited power, no switching outside of the pure A1… etc, etc,  etc…. What is the most remarkable that very same Lamm ML3 for instance still might be used but it would just need deferent output transforms. The Lamm ML3 for LF and Lamm ML3 for HF would have transformers for $400-$500 each but the level of performance of the theoretical Lamm ML3 DSET (Dedicated SET) would be so high that the full-range Lamm ML3 could not even imagine it in its dreams. So, in the example above, looking at the way in which any expensive SET might be used in the real world of serious demands I hardly see any needs worth $100.000 SET. Quite oppositely, I feel that if the SET is more expensive then I would say $7.000-$8.000 then this SET should be divided on two frequencies-depended SETs (DSET), with price of $4.500 each. The Lamm ML3 with it’s (looks like) composite driver stage might most likly to pump a lot of current and it would be so rational to put in there a second GM70 on the same chassis with own transformer, driving it from the same driver stage. The PS and the rest “support” is easy manageable (ML3 has the filaments filters right inside of the amp instead of inside the PS). If ML3 were DSET then it would be phenomenally interesting to see what a direct-heated GM70 might do, that I would like to see the driver stage direct-heated as well – whoa the hell heed a half-ass solutions!? Also it context of DSET it would be much smaller space for the Lamm’s attitude as it would be a relatively not demanding OPT where Vladimir would have mush less space for his “it is enough for them”…. Sumizing my feeling about Lamm ML3 I feel that I would be an OK amplifier but at which level? Certainly it will be expensive amplifiers with Vladimir attempt to place with this SET one ass on many chairs. I was explaining all those sentiments to a friend of mine but he told me that I’m delusional.  He said: “Come on Romy, people out there do not think this way. They pay a lot of money for a brown track to deliver to them and bid expensive loudspeaker of a ‘good’ brand name and they anticipate that by virtue of large investment in a “marketingly developed brand” they would automatically get an interesting sound in their listening rooms.” Sure, those people would perfectly accept ML3 as a solution. He was defiantly correct but I do not see those people because I am delusional but because I refuse to acknowledge them. I do it because the actual result that that those people get in your listening rooms are not worth attention. Well, perhaps I am delusional but as I said in the beginning of this post – I have my opinion and I agree with it. I do see good prospective for Lamm ML3 to become a suitable solution for many listeners that have dull speakers and some money to spend. Strategically I feel it is wrong direction to use dead speakers and powerful amplification, - I more inclined to “live” speakers and low power amplification, but it juts me…I have also concern that 32W of ML3 is NOT enough for the most of 90dB sensitive speakers it is not about juts volume but “quality” – most of the 90dB sensitive speakers need 100W -150W of class A to demonstrate something worth attention… If you need evidenced lock yourself in a small closet with 85dB sensitive speaker and a good SET (Vintage Lamm ML2 for instance) and play music. You will have more then enough volume but the sound will be still crappy. There is more to sound then just power-sensitively-room size ratio but it is a different subject. In fact I have some feeling that building that slightly ridicules driver Vladimir in his 3 stage design Vladimir did some interspersing bluff. The 32W is not enough to drive most of the speakers out there. For instance the 95dB sanative Wilson (the Wilson customers are the people to whom Lamm would like to pith the ML3) are not as will with his ML2, ML2 might do much better (but there are not good commercial high sensitivity speaks out there). However, the 32W of ML3 are not there also.  So, I think Lamm in ML3 might made higher gain (look at that high gain inpit stage on 12AX7) but with lower power. Let pretend that ML3 had as much as 30dB gain not those damn Wilsons will sound “loud”. You will ask but how about the power – they will collapse into clipping in the peaks? Well, it would be in fact very … good for Wilsons. The Wilsons have 4th Order Bandpas enclosure at the bottom and if you drive it all the way up then it sounds like…4th Order Bandpas. So, it might be the Lamm thought to “compensate” of to mask the problem of the “contemporary woofers” with the “deficiency of his new amplifier? The people out there are deaf and stupid anyhow, and they will listen anything… they bought their Wilsons at the first place…. Anyhow, I feel the ML2 will be warmly accepted by audio public, the same public that very warm accepts the Ml2.1, Kelll  and Dynaudio. It will be another stupid review from another Moron with Wilson MAXX and we all know that will be in the review and what will be next. The audio public is mostly ignorant and has reference points of pterodactyls and demands of vultures - why they should not love ML3? The “big reviewer” Lars Feudal was listening his ML2 with 88.5dB sensitive Veruty Parsifal and was pitching that ML2 was the best amplifier in the word. How he came to this conclusion I had no idea – I head his room and never understood it. Mike from “Audio Federation” (courtesy to whom the images above) has written in his blog: “Lamm did play their one working ML3 on one of the Wilsons and Neli got to hear it for quite some time….  summarize, she liked it - it appears to be SIGNIFICANTLY better than the ML2.1 in ALL audiophile attributes, especially control of the speaker, dynamics, and transparency.” I have no doubts that it was exactly how he described, however the following facts might be taken under consideration: 1) ML2.1 is VERY unfortunate amplifiers 2) ML2.1 with Wilsons Watt/Puppy (and partulasy not the 6.3 but 8.0 is not juts unfortunate but nightmarish. 3) What dos it means “better”: more like ML2.1 or more like ML2? In the end – if the Lamm ML3 will help to some people to discover how SET might sound then it will be fine – the ML3 extends this SET application for a 3dB of sensitively form where ML2 was. Neli, Mike, Vladimir and whoever else  who accustomed to the funny Kharmas,  Wilsons, JM-Labs  and the rest of the mid 90dB sensitive load might eventually with the help of Lamm ML3 learn how a first watt of the vintage Lamm ML2 sounded with a proper over 100dB sensitive load. I am glad that Lamm electronics continue to be educational. I learned a lot from ML2 and a lot among the expressed in this post came form ML2 made me to think. Now it is up to the others to care the torch of the education and since ML2 is no longer available nowadays the Lamm ML3 might be for somebody a useful tool in his/her educational journey about audio. Still, the election of W Bush in White House Lamm celebrated with release of his L2 preamp – the first “idiosyncratic” product from Vladimir. In 2001 I called L2 as the “Electronics of the fist year of nothingness in America”. Will the ML3 become the “Electronics of the seventh year of nothingness in America”? The answer will be pending…..

I received an email today:

http://www.soundstage.com/revequip/lamm_ml3_signature.htm  Too bad you can't afford this amp jerkoff!

To which I replayed:

Thanks for pointing out. If you have little brain then you would understand why I do not need this amp.

Anyhow, I glance at the review even though I did not read it carefully but I did detect any points in the review that I would consider interesting.  The review is quite banal   thinking with multiple stupid assumptions – nothing unexpected.  No event in other words and it is kind of shame. I hoped that ML3 with its current pumping driver and the output stage that can run in A2 would be a good tool for the Morons what use dead speakers.  It looks like that Marc Mickelson in his estimable style Xeroxed another empty review. The question is not about the review but if the ML3 is just another Lamm’s Xeroxed product. Well, the review in Soundstage does not give answer to it. I do not think that Marc did it intentionally, he just is too much simpleton to understand what audio is all about… So, the review is about nothing – Mark was pushing out himself reasons and motivations for his readers to buy this amp. Was it all why the ML3 was built for? Well, if then under the ML3 chassis Vladimir might put a Yamaha SS commercial receiver and the ML3 would be sold with the same enthusiasm. After all Lamm did it with ML2.1 and the deaf cheerleader Marc Mickelson was trampling and drumming that dead fraudulent amp with the same eagerness as he does any other crap the is given to him.

I actually read the review carefully.

My initials sentiments were very accurate.  Knowing the Vladimir’s reaction to those thighs I might presume that he also feels that this level of “intelligent writing about audio” is no more intellectual then blabbering of a kindergarten infant.

Besides the regular audio-reviewing short-mildness there are few specific moments that I would like to comment.

“ The ML3 Signature is proudly a no-feedback design, which makes the inclusion of the feedback switches curious. "They are there mostly for educational purposes," is Vladimir's reasoning, the switches allowing owners to add 1.2 or 2.4dB of local feedback, meaning in the output stage only. While adding feedback will lower output impedance, seemingly making the amps suitable for use with tougher loads, Vladimir doesn't advocate this. "I prefer to deal with a healthy child," was his aphoristic explanation. Translation: Pick speakers that will work with the amps; don't tailor the amps to the speakers, even if you are able to by adding feedback. Indeed, either feedback level softened the sound of the amps and foreshortened the soundstage. Try it and then forget it's there is my advice.”

I would live the adjustable feedback future aside. It is not as big toy as Mickelson/Lamm are trying to present. Most of the people out there will be using ML3 with ported speakers that have very ugly reactance to bass driver when the port kicks in. The ML3’s feedback might deal reactance, damping the bass driver with modified output impedance of the amp. It is toy? Well, any ported speaker is a toy as far as I concern… So, living the feedback on output tube aside what we have left?  It would be the Mark’s statement “ML3 Signature is proudly a no-feedback design”. Sorry, but it is a bullshit, in fact not bullshit but deliberate disinformation, shout it be call fraud on the Mr. Mickelson’s side? Furthermore, knowing that all Soundstage reviews are corrected and signed of by manufactures before they published would the fact that Lamm approved it be an intentional deception on Lamm side? The ML3 has 12AX7 in input state and I give you 100% assurance that it coved by feedback, most likely from the driver stage. The 12AX7 has under 1V on grid and it is imposable to use this tube at live level signals input without feedback. There is nothing wrong to do it: the ML2 does it and any other devises that use low bias tubes at input. I am very certain that ML3 does not drive the input stage into grid currents and feeds most likely cathode with feedback. How this makes the ML3 being the “proudly a no-feedback design”?  I am not against feedback; I am against loading people with BS. Why Mickelson did not write that ML3 is nuclear powered?   It would be as accurate as saying that ML3 is “proudly a no-feedback design”. Very sad…

“You may be wondering why there are no measurements accompanying this review. It's not because Vladimir Lamm didn't want them -- quite the contrary, as we've measured many of his products in the past. No, the amps I received for review are serial numbers 1 and 2, and, due to a supplier issue, they have different output transformers than production units that followed. "The amps are sonically identical," Vladimir explained, "but their measurements will be slightly different from those of a production amplifier." Given this, we had a choice to make: publish the very first review of the amps or wait until Vladimir could send production models for review and measurements, which may never happen, given that Lamm doesn't have a stock of the amps. We went with the former -- and decided to divulge all of this for the sake of completeness. We hope to publish measurements of the ML3 Signature in the future (and I just might have to do some follow-up listening).”

Ironically I was suspecting something like this from Lamm. It is not allegation but juts my suspicions: Lamm played very fealty games with ML2.1. The ML2.1 was very poor sounding amp. Most likely ML2.1 had simplified (means much cheaper to make) design and specifications. I do not think that Lamm did it intentionally it just happened and he did not care, I would not if I were him. So, Lamm kept for reviewing purposes a number of ML2.1 amps with the ML2.0 intestines. The reason why I feel this way because I personally heard a pair of the very early ML2.1 production that did sound OK. Then the rest of ML2.1 sounded like a Denon receiver… now the question is – what would be the “default” sound of ML3 if the company has the alleged reputation to moderate quality of production models (it happened with L2 preamps as well) and partially knowing that ML3 is built to order?

“And then it does get better. Amps like the ML3 Signatures, which use hard-to-find tubes that have no substitutes, don't really lend themselves to trips down the new-old-stock path. However, Vladimir Lamm has a small cache -- about six sets -- of some copper-plate GM70s. The amps come stock with carbon-plate GM70s, and it is with these tubes in use that my comments about the amps up to this point have been written. The copper-plate tubes are a different breed from the stock tubes, increasing the leading-edge speed and midrange detail just enough to make clear their superiority. They sound more spacious too, never a bad thing with a tube amp, and a very good thing when an amp is single ended. While Vladimir Lamm is reluctant to sell these tubes, ML3 Signature owners who won't accept anything short of the very best sound possible should contact him. I shudder to think what a pair of these tubes -- when Vladimir has only six -- will cost.”

Oh, come on! People build GM70 amps for years and the graphite vs. copper anode on GM70 is an old subject. (BTW, some people prefer graphite but them the GM70 shell be used slightly different). As I understand the purpose of this crap was to bust interest to “unique” and “secretive” copper-plate GM70. I am sure Lamm have $1000 price tag on it in his “limited cache”. Well, the graphite GM70 you can pack with shovel in Russia for the price of a few 6C33C or a dozen 12AX7. The copper-plate GM70 is less common and this is why it cost 30-50 more expansive: $60-$100 per tube instead of the regular $25-$60. How that all makes sense when we are talking about $140.000 amps I clearly have no idea.

“The Lamm amps that showed up here were a well-used demo pair that immediately displayed an unusual lateral shift of the soundstage. I flip-flopped the amps to make sure they were the cause, and the center image shifted in the other direction. Luckily it's easy to check the ML3 Signature's operating status (as long as you have a volt-ohm meter), and this revealed the problem: One of the GM70 tubes couldn't be adjusted to its normal plate current, so the amplifier in which that tube was used was noticeably lower in output. Lamm sent a replacement pair of tubes, and this solved the problem, reinvigorating the sound in the process. While the maintenance involved in owning tube amps gives some audiophiles cold sweats, the ML3 Signature and, indeed, all Lamm amps are about as easy to own as a tube amp can be.”

Way to go, Mr. Reviewer!!! So, you was listing amps with screwed plate current on one of output tubes and desired to correct it ONLY after you detect the unusual lateral shift of the soundstage? So, if the soundstage did not shift then you would run the amps as they were?

“A friend of mine who owns some very good hybrid and solid-state amplifiers maintains that the best bass he's ever heard came from Lamm ML2s. Having owned those amps, I have an idea of what he means …”

I relay hate what ANY of those “reviewers” does it! This is YOUR article and you thought (pursuable thought not juts typing. Do not trade in your article somebody’s else view and judgments!!!

“….. This music flowed from the Wilson Audio X-2 Series 2 speakers, which created a soundfield that was wall to wall and, more significantly, from the floor to nearly the ceiling. This gave the upright bass truly lifelike stature, and each note of the guitar was carved out from the others by the amps' handling of transients.”

Well, this is what I would expect from GM70 amp. I wrote about it before, read my comment about the GM70’s “Elephant Sound”. The large plate and high anode voltage do have tendency to make sound large, partially the higher anode voltage, forcing the output transformer to have more isolation, making HF uniquely-dehydrated. That all crate in big transition tube that run high voltage a very lucrative perception of “size”. I would not argue that but I would argue if those amps can play “small” if the music is called upon. I witnessed that the amps that go into “elephant sound” do not do well with “minuteness”. I do not hear the ML3 and I do not know how it hands it but I did not see in the review this subject even touched. If you can tolerate the “size” of the presentation that Martin Logan Statement throw on you with ALL MUSIC than you should not worry…

In the end, there was another subject that was no touched in the review and I found it very peculiar. Marc Mickelson stressed a lot of transients, transients and one more time transients but he never even thought how the transients projected to harmonics. What the hell he was listening in ML3 if he did not comment on this subject?

One more thing that I would like to point out in context of the recent Marc Mickelson’s review. Marc wrote:

“The Atma-Sphere amps are certainly more powerful than the ML3 Signatures, but not noticeably so unless you clip the Lamm amps. “

Here is where Mark, as most of his dim-witted and easy on mouth ruining colleges, just mentioned the clipping of ML3 as some kind of self-understandable fact. He, I am sure, had clipped ML3 with his Wilsons and knows what he is talking about. Sure, you dream!!! Those idiots-reviewers just toss the words without any meaning and most of the time without any understanding of what they are saying.  Anyhow, forget about the Mickelson – he was spreading his stupid weeping about ML3, trying make Lamm to give him the amp for so call “long term landing” – Lamm might just do so even despite to the fact the Mickelson sold his former “long term landing”  (Lamm L2 preamp). It is just a cost of doing busses in high end industry – somebody shit on your head and you kiss them in the ass juts because it is profitable…

So, as I said forget about the Mickelson the Reviewer - there is more interesting fish to fry. The subject of my attention is the Lamm ML3 clipping as I feel ML3 might be a very good tool to research and finally to answer the question of SET clipping. 

Let pretend that we have ML3 driving some kind of reasonable load and the signal voltage goes up. What would restring the power of the output and what would make this SET to clip? Living the various moments of bad and stupid design out we would have the following suspects:

1)  Input stage clips
2)  Driver stage clips
3)  Output  Transformer Clips

The stages might clips by current or by voltage but we presume that Lamm know what he does and ML3’s stages are properly powered, loaded and current or and voltage clip at the same time. So, the ML3’s input stage would be hardly a suspect of clipping as it sit on feedback and the cathode voltage will be lifted up with the output voltage goes up. The Output Transformer might be the one that clips first but we have no control or knowledge how it was designed and where it intended to begin to clipping. Then we have the Driver stage that might go into clipping – here is where the subject of ML3 become very interning.

Lamm made the ML3 driver with 4 paralleled 6H30 assuring that the driver stage can produce very high current. Why we need a lot of current in there?  Because the next stage has only limited amount of voltage on the GM70’s grid. As soon the positive voltage of the signal goes up and become equal to the negative voltage on the GM70’s grid then the tube enter to class A2 operation and develop currents. To navigate the tube further the source stage shell be able to battle the grid current with own current capacity. Having the 4x6H30 is a very powerful current source, so the ML3 has a good provision to have driver stage to be very clipping-resistant.

Now, let compare the clipping-resistance of ML3 and Melquiades. Melquiades driver stage is very current-weak-it has only 18mA. Melquiades was design to have absolutely different objectives then ML3. Melquiades use voltage driver stage – the tube with very high gain (35) that takes sub 3.5V of input stage (-4V on bios)  and with just one single amplification stags it might develops over 120V to drive the output stage. There are two reasons why Milq never care about currant.

First reason, the Milq meant to drive very high sensitivity loads. Take a look the Milq’s driver performance. It is the performance of driver of the bass channel, loaded to the bass section of Macondo and paling heavy bass music for 10dB-12dB louder than I ever play in ordinary.

 The 0V AC is at the bottom of the screen between the first and second square. The scope is set for 10V/div and 9 divisions up we have -92V of the bias voltage of my output tube. The positive AC voltage of signal runs up and doe but it never apaches the square 10, the rise of 90V what it would go into class A2. So, with the sensitivity of Macondo more current out of the Milq’s driver stage is just not necessary

The second reason why Milq never meant to have currant capable driver is because Melquiades using the 6C33C. Let pretend that that in my measurement above I loaded the amp to an equivalent resistor and drive it with even more voltage. Then the driver stage will send to output tube the voltage that would be equal to more than the 6C33C’s bias and the 6C33C go to A2 operation. In fact it was what I did and what happen?  6C33C responses very none linearly and clips quite fast. I was driving the driver tubes with 35mA and once even paralleled them trying to see how 6C33C would behave if the driver can push over the grid current. The 6C33C responded very stubborn and not very good. It looks to me that 6C33C hated grid current.

OK, how it all related to Lamm ML3. Well, Lamm is in a very different game as he has no two Melquiades’ reason I descried above.  Obviously Lamm would like his amp to be able to drive as wide range of speakers in tern sensitively as possible – in fact he knows that most of them will be in 90s dB not in 100s dB. And the second is that ML3 uses not A2-hating 6C33C but the A2-loving GM70. The GM70 is direct heated and it has no problems to work positive voltage on grid – many transmission tubes were designed to do it. So, the only this that Lamm case in his case was to build a good current supply for the GM70’s A2 operation – if it ever goes there… Here is where the 4 paralleled 6H30 come handy. BTW, many do not know it and fell that 6H30, or the BAT’ Super Tube is the wonderful discovery of Victor Khomenko from BAT. It is not the case. The 6H30 was suggested to Victor Khomenko by Vladimir Lamm before Victor knew the tune and the business -savvy Victor converted it into the BAT’s marketing success.

That all is relatively know and simple things but there is one big aspect behind all of it, the aspect that I do not know how to judge and it might be exactly where ML3 might be  wonderful tool to research. We have a tube that is capable and that “likes” the A2 operation. We have the driver stage that is perfectly cable to support the tube in the class A2. So, what would happen with Sound when the tube favorably inclined to the A2 conditions does enter the A2? This is VERY interning question and the Lamm ML3 might be a wonderful playground to research the subject. I do not really know if the A2m operation is bad by the definition or it is bad juts because in most of the cases it is just badly implemented. I still do not think that crossing between A1 and A2 would have no consequences to Sound but I never had the environmentally and methodologically clean condition to do this assessment, nor did I need it with 110dB sensitivity…  The ML3 would be a good opportunity to try answer this question but it would be too much for Marc Mickelson to ask. Not to mention that 4-other band bass woofer at the bottom of the Wilsons would certainly disqualify Mark from making any more or less lucid appraisal on the subject of class A2 entering….

decoud wrote:

I imagine the resistance to the DSET concept does not come from idiocy - Lamm may well be steeped in vanity and avarice, but he is certainly no idiot - but from resistance to combining amplification and loudspeaker in a single, coherent, monolithic system. Abstracted from the conventions of the audio world, it makes no sense to unify the amplification step when the transduction step is necessarily segregated. I wonder what Lamm said when you spoke to him about the DSET idea (as I imagine you must have done, no)?

Decoud,

I do not think Lamm’s idiocy is even under a question. Lamm, in my view, do exhibit some idiotic behavior in the realm of business conducting – the subject that is totally out of public view, however in Lamm design aspects there is zero idiocy. I do not know, nether care what Lamm think about DSET concept. His thinking and his expression of his thinking is highly conditioned. The last time I dealt with Lamm in 2002 and I remember that the last few months of our relationship was very frustrated by the internally made fence of lie and deception that Lamm was creating around his views. Perhaps it was his reaction to my emerging from my ignorance/moronity. Anyhow, it developed within me lack of respect and in a way revulsion – why do you think I terminated that relationship? So, I would not be the best person to ask “what Lamm thinks”. I have my outlook toward to the Lamm’s view, not to mention that what Lamm thinks is well described by what Lamm does. Still, Vladimir designs for public consumption and we know (as well as he knows) that public consumption is not overly demanding and not overly serious. There is also no infrastructure among the park of ready to use speakers that would be accommodated to use with DSETs. I am sure if to put Lamm in a condition where he would not be restricted by the boundaries or industry conditions then it would be possible to milk much more interesting result from him. How Lamm is different in this aspect from most of other manufacturers?

Romy the Cat wrote:

...There is also no infrastructure among the park of ready to use speakers that would be accommodated to use with DSETs... The Cat

Here are a few comments by Mike of Audio Federation about his exposure to new Lamm ML3 amp:

http://audiofederation.com/blog/archives/498

In fact it was more interning then the entire review in Soundstage, at least more informative. A few comments that I would like to make in context of the Mike’s impressions.

I am glad that Mike provided a positive feedback about ML3’s micro-dynamics (whatever it means) as I always feel that the micro-detailness was always a weak point of large transmission high voltage tubes. (Look more for the “Elephant Sound” at http://www.romythecat.com/Forums/ShowPost.aspx?postID=2182). It is possible that Lamm found a way to deal with it …or it might not be so. I have my doubts about the Mike’s comments as he was selling and listing his Ongaku for years and he never was complaining that Ongaku were micro-details challenged (and the always were). Another problem of mine is that Mike used ML3 with EMM Labs front end and with Marten Coltrane Supreme loudspeakers. The EMM Labs has a sound of person chewing aluminum foil, at least it was how it sound 3-4 years back. EMM has that unpleasant character of street prostitute make up, where smell, colors and shape are there but the substance is good only for 10 minutes service. The Marten Coltrane is not far from there – sort of glorified Kharma loudspeaker make for the people who have more money but even less ears. I have to admit that I generally hate any speakers that use stupid ceramic drivers with soft suspensions and Marten Coltrane is kind of the pinnacle of it. So, I wonder if the reported by Mike ML3’s micro-dynamics is in fact not the micro-dynamics but juts the infertile hypo –resolution of Marten’s cone and EMM Labs’s “hi-fi quality”?

The rest Mike’s comments are too dull to comment about them seriously. It would be interesting to hear the Mike’s comment about ML3’s sound after the show. Mike always overly-exuberant about the things he sells and I do not consider his feedback important but he sometimes subconsciousnessly drops between the lines a few pointers that might be worth something.

In response to http://audiofederation.com/blog/archives/501

The Federated Mike wrote:

First, the Ongaku, the Audio Note …. U.K.(!) … Ongaku, that we have here is not micro-details challenged [to say the least]. The Kondo Ongaku may indeed be challenged in this way - certainly sounds that way at shows… but then again, they put the darn things on nightstands and other suspiciously inadequate platforms that are probably sucking all the micro-details out of whatever there was there to begin with.

Mike, you got to be kidding, are you? Anyhow, I am sure that when Kondo designed his Ongaku he put in the specification the condition that amp must be used only with the stands that available for sale at Audio Federation store… I heard that he died at CES what he died when somebody accidentally put his amps on flore, is it true?

The Federated Mike wrote:

If any of you weren’t happy with digital four of five years ago - and gave up on it - give it another try. Digital music reproduction has evolved significantly in the last few years, along with the rest of the digital landscape.

Does it mean that if you look at your posts 4-5 years ago then I will find that you complained that EMM at that time was horrible? What made then to change their way beside the demands of their marketing flaks to introduce each year new model in order to extract new cash from the gullible but deaf Morons who buy this things?

The Federated Mike wrote:

And, just another pet peeve , the sound of the Martens are in fact almost diametrically opposite to the sound of Kharmas.

In the way how YOU see it, not me.

The Federated Mike wrote:

And regardless of all this - our reportage was about the sound of the ML3s in comparison to what we have heard here before - namely the ML2.1 and the higher level Audio Note.

I do not know about this. I never heard the ML3 and I have no opinion about it’s sound. I do not know if I ever will hear ML3 at the conditions that I feel worth to be critical. I know defiantly that I would not extend a lot of credit to Martens acoustic system as they are at very opposite direction to what I feel is “better way to go”. The acoustic systems is in a way was always the “Lamm’s curse” – he never was able to demonstrate his electronics with right speakers. His dealers push his electronics not with whatever it necessary to mate sonically but with whatever is profitable for them to sell, the way you do. Lamm never was able to establish good relationship with “interesting” speakers makers and always used the sonic bottom-eaters (10 year of sponsoring Kharma is of the exemplas). Wait for a few month/years and you will see Lamms will be demoed with Magicos or whatever the industry trumpetists will spin then…

The Federated Mike wrote:

And, as far as “Mike always overly-exuberant about the things he sells”, well, I try to be clear about why I recommend various things, whether we sell them or not, that I think people would love to hear for themselves. But me? Overly exuberant? If you knew me, you’d realize how much of a stretch this would be. But seriously, most people want me to be MORE exuberant on the blog - but less so than the typical reviewer - so that is the balance I struggle for.

Please, you do not wahnt to discuss this subject with me.

The Federated Mike wrote:

Anyway, Romy, you are welcome to visit here anytime, or our room at RMAF. Then, at least you would know *exactly* how bad everything sounds.

Thinks, I do not go to shows anymore, too boring and too much off the marks of my interests. It is actually why I am interning to hear your comments if the comments are free from idiotic glorification agenda and your desire to pitch to the hoodlums the BS what they would like to read. I will be reading you follow-up about ML3 sound, it is despite of the fact that you (as well as anybody else) have very positive feedback about own sonic accomplishments at the shows and despite that eat show I have attended each room sound beyond any criticism.

In his RMAF the Federated Mike post some comments about his use of ML3:

http://www.audiofederation.com/hifiing/2008/RMAF2008/report/1500/floor_9/#audio_federation

Even though his comments from my point of view have “issuers” but Mike’s comments still are way more natural then the asphyxiated crap that paid “industry reviewer” have written about ML3. Here are the Federated Mike's comments that related to Lamm’s new SET. The rest of the comments you might red at the Federated Blog:

The Lamm ML3 amps preformed spectacularly. Much more macro dynamics than at home. Likely due to HRS under Marten crossover and solidity of floor.

The ML3 is the pinnacle of the audiophile amplifier. It does all those audiophile things. Unlikely to be challenged for a decade or more. Solid-state approaches the ideal but controlling the note waveform well-enough to imitate music is not/may not ever be on the agenda. Audio Note is taking a different approach altogether [energy transfer] focusing on musicality, happy to sacrifice uber resolution and imaging when necessary. WAVAC is going for something, unknown, but unfortunately not harmonics and correct decay. Kondo, in my opinion, was going for spiritual essence. Who else is there?

About average equipment, one describes what they do well.

About excellent equipment one describes what they do not do well.

But the Lamm ML3 doesn't really do anything unexcellent. I can contrast and compare to the Audio Note Kegon Balanced and Ongaku... but, really, for the audiophile who is searching for that sound - that instantiation of everything audiophiles have been striving for in the last few decades - this is it. The exact, expected amount of harmonics [between Joule and WAVAC. OK, everybody is between Joule and WAVAC, But...], superb linearity [linearity in the harmonic content, micro- midi- and macro-dynamics up and down the frequency spectrum], resolution that has not been seen in an amplifier before, control of the microforms of each note never before seen in an amplifier, ... More later. And we were just starting to learn about this amp. Great amps take years to understand.

What will probably shock :-) the Lamms, who play Jazz and mostly Classical music, is that these amps... or at least this system with the ML3s, love Hendrix-style guitar. We talked about how these sounded great on Stevie Ray Vaughan's Tin Pan Alley. How it captured the slow guitar picks with such exquisite care that we just felt honored to be able to finally experience Stevie's talent in our living room. For all these years, I never knew how good he was. Sure, we heard the LP many times. But to hear how he was laying the pick across the strings, and how he was moving the strings around to get the exact sound - and to HEAR the exact sound he was going for....

And at the show, someone brought in a copy of the Woodstock LP, they gave it to Neli and I was out of the room at the beginning - but during the song, and into the Star Spangled Banner - it was just so colorful and rich and each layer of sound was rendered so accurately and firmly. Jimi's rendition never sounded so damned excruciatingly BEAUTIFUL before. Yeah, it is was and still is an in-your-face we-are-here noisy shout of rebellion from the youth to the old stodgy class who always seem to be trying to stop everyone from having fun, no matter which decade it is. But there seemed to be a lot more there, that the ML3 was able to extract how much effort Jimi put in, how much love and anguish and anger and caring about America he put into each of his notes. Perhaps I was reading too much into his technique - but this was really intense.

Neli tells me that she has had similar experiences with solo violin and operettas. That the ML3's capture the riveting nature of a soloist - just like a live performance. [Neli: It's not like the complexity of the orchestral background is lost -- in fact, there is a real sense, say, of individual violins in the string section -- but the listener's attention is drawn to the beauty and power of the soloists performance -- just like what happens IMO at a live show. At each level everything is rendered in perfect proportion.].

Thinking about it now - it is apparent that the system itself, even this system, in support of the Lamms, was a limiting factor.  For example, we used a 10 meter run of Valhalla, which, although sounding better at longer lengths, still should be ODIN. Well, not should be, but it would sure be nice. Another example: Nordost was kind enough to lend us a ODIN power cord, but how we wished for a PAIR; we would have put them on the ML3s. Another example: The ML3s were all on HRS M3 bases, which are the best vibration isolation available today. But the M3s were on the carpet, and putting the M3 on SXR amp stands would add another little extra boost in performance, The point is that with these amps, the system can evolve and continue to be upgraded for a very long time and you will just hear more and more of what the amps can REALLY do.

Romy the Cat wrote:

http://www.lammindustries.com/SHOWHIST/ces2009_report.html

Behind the “expected” comment form a few industry revisers there is something that I did not see. Look at the Wes Phillips’ comment under the picture of Lamm’s ML3 circuit board: “This is what the Lamm ML3 Signature looks like under the hood. Clean layout and P2P wiring throughout.”

Really, the point to point wiring throughout? Did you not a nuclear reactor in the first stage and the underwear of Princes Diana in the second and the coupling made by the Brooklyn Bridge architecture? Is ability to express idiocy the mandatory requirement to become a Stereophile staff reviewer? What actually even more finnier is not the fact of Mr. Phillips comment but the Lamm decided to publish this idiocy on his web site and by doing it he actually “certified” Phillips’ comments. Very funny!

Romy the Cat wrote:

Anyhow, this Oneobgyn retard did his typical pearl that made me very happy for all Lamm users:

“…. the output tubes are GM-70 (not GL-70) and come stock with a carbon plate. FWIW, Vladimir managed to find 6 pair of GM-70 copper plated tubes which apparently all there were in the world. I bought a pair (not cheap at $900/pair). Presents a totally different sound than the carbon plated GM-70's”

(from http://www.avguide.com/blog/listening-alert-state-the-art-the-lamm-ml3-signature-the-lamm-ll1-signature)

BTW, Oneobgyn wrote the ML3 used 6H30 tubes and this is not true. 10 years ago BAT marketing whore assured that they bought out all remaining 6H30 stock in the world. If so then how the damn Lamm (and zillion of other manufacturers) are able to source 6H30 for his amp. Imposable! Anyhow, I am glad that the idiot paid $900 for GM-70. I am sure that Lamm contributed a portion of it to the Glenn Beck’s Restoring Honor rally and I am sure the money came back to him via his new stupid customers…

Anyhow, if you see any copper GM70 then be advised that they are contraband from Mars so, Oneobgyn, boil it before sticking it on your own ass.

A few years back an editor of a “famous” audio publication asked me if I write for him. I explained to him that I have no interest to build my own audio clientele, that have no cronies manufacturers whose products I would like to promote, that I have no audio-circles who I would like to patronize and to get their worthless benefits from them and it is highly unlikely that his publication would be able even to touch the subjects that I am interested in audio. But as any respected myself whore-contractor I asked him how much he would pay me for a “review”. He said that he pays $200 but in my specials case he can go to $250. I replied that unit he talks about $20K it will be no further conversation. He told me that I was an idiot. The feeling was mutual in that case.

A few days ago somebody told me that The Absolute Sound published a review by Peter Breuninger about Lamm ML3 and LL1. I have mentioned Peter Breuninger in here:

http://www.GoodSoundClub.com/TreeItem.aspx?PostID=14480

In my post I did not call Mr. Breuninger  as an idiot but that was making fun on the comment of the dirt that really hate: “Oneobgyn” aka Steve Williams. That level of retards that Lamm is associated nowadays, good for him…

Anyhow, returning back to the Peter Breuninger review.  I do not know who Peter is it looks like he come to “reviewing circle” from “outside” but what he did is exactly what I call get when you paid $200 for a man to do the job. Even I do like some Peter’s attempts but desire to talk like the “reviewing establishment” is absolutely idiotic. Only his own expressions about ML3 (no matter how few of them in the review) are interesting and somehow accurate. The rest is file with cookie-cutter stupidity or ignorant mistakes.

The reciting of the story that Lamm does not design with listening tests is foolish. The comments like “…output transformer can handle idiotic amount of current. Voltages and currents are simply off the charts in SET designs” are to idiot to criticize. The GM70 suddenly become the “Russian Military transmitting tube” that in fact is lie - GM70 was made for transportation communications systems (railroad signaling and so on). There are many moments like this… but it all come with $200 price tag – what else could be expected.

Frankly speaking I do discard the Peter Breuninger comment as he is absolutely wrong person to express his opinion about ML3. What a guy who before ML3 used MBL 101E has to say about anything. Get yourself a pair Lamm M1.1 and spend a few years to learn about your MBL 101E. Would it be obvious that any person who has interest in sound of new Lamm amp would like to hear from people who used and well-familiar with Lamm ML2.0? Lamm ML2.0 was in production for 8 years I believe and among all very positive reviews there was NONE that give the ML2.0a justness of evaluation. The ML2.0never was properly reviewed and most of the people out there still did not know what kind amp it was and what it was capable of. Interesting that among a 2-3 dozens of ML2.0 owners that I know/knew I know one 3 people who in my view are familiar with ML2.0 sound (excluding Lamm). If anything, I would like to hear their perception about ML3, the perception that based the deep familiarly with ML2.0.

To get a guy who juts catapulted from MBL planet to make him to write his thoughts about Lamm ML3 and LL1 is worthless. I do not blame Peter Breuninger. He did his part of unconsciousness reviewing imitations. I do not think he had bad intentions. I did the same in my past what I was subconsciously structuring my thoughts into “existing reviewing format”.  It was back in 2000, thanks I am 10 year more mature from that:

http://www.audioasylum.com/reviews/Amplifier-Tube/Lamm-Audio-Laboratory/any/general/41695.html

But the point is that Peter Breuninger’s 95% of expressionism is just a tribute to the same subconsciously crap the inquiry implemented into the minds of audio users.  Peter did not have bad intentions but because he wanted to end up with a “review” his own novel about ML3 and LL1 ended to be 95% of plagiarism from any single industry idiot who wrote those stupid reviews before him. As the result the review was empty and the light was no lit on ML3 and LL1. Was no lit again….

Perhaps he's still trying to wrap his mind around the experience?  In any case, it's definitely not ready for the Robb Report!  There was the requisite mention of "components in this price category" but, otherwise, is he awestruck, or simply dumb-struck, like Harry Pearson meets Mr. Bean?  I think he means to exalt the thing; but from reading the blurb with my usual inattention, it's not clear (let alone compelling) why.

On the one hand, it's amazing there hasn't been more (better) written about this amp by now.  On the other hand, at this price point, this seems almost inevitable.

Best regards,
Paul S

Paul S wrote:

What one NEVER hears from these guys is why and how they evolve their sound over time, and this is because the particular product or products is/are the focus….