Thread: BAT REX II Mono Amps vs ML No536 Mono’s

So I’ve been running by BAT REX II Preamp and ML No536 amps for almost 5 years and have really enjoyed it! I finally got the itch however to try an all tube setup and when I found a great deal on a pair of BAT REX II Mono amps I took the dive! Tonight is my first night listening so these are my first impressions …

The REX II amps are much more open sounding on every track I played regardless of type of music. A more holographic soundstage as well though the Levinsons perform well there also. Brushes are softer and more realistic sounding and the piano and Saxes are amazing on the all tube setup. The bottom end is definitely not as aggressive as the Levinson’s but it’s not bad either. I’d say that there is the impression that the Levinson amps will dissect the music and give the impression of more detail and they might be slightly more detailed although the REX’s provide a more wholistic picture of the music which is just as satisfying if not maybe more real sounding. Still I have to say the Levinson’s do extract a bit more detail from some tracks. One area the Levinsons win hands down is in slam and dynamics but it’s not really a fair comparison there … 160 watts on the REX’s at the 4 ohm load of my Wilson Alexx vs the 800 Watt at 4 ohm rating of the No536. Chalk up the win there for the Levinsons. If I stay with the REX’s I’ll likely upgrade to the newest version the REX III and give serious consideration to running 4 of them .. and yes I have dedicated AC for the room. So far the amps haven’t warmed up the room at all. :-)

It does take about a good hour for the BAT amps to really open up and sound great and I suspect that the power tubes are in need of replacement as the previous owner gave me an estimate of around 1800 hours on the 6c33’s so I’ll be ordering a new set of those shortly.

Well … that’s about it for initial impressions. I’ll update over the weekend as I get more time with the amps and start leaning towards deciding which I’ll be keeping and which will move on for now.

George

Can you bi-amp your wilson's using the MLs for the bass?
Might be an interesting experiment.

No ... Wilson Audio doesn't make their speakers with the ability to bi-amp.

George

Then what did you mean when you said, "you might run 4 of them", when referring to buying the other model of BAT amp?

Thanks for the comparison.

Originally Posted by gadawg

No ... Wilson Audio doesn't make their speakers with the ability to bi-amp.

George

Originally Posted by Mr Peabody

Then what did you mean when you said, "you might run 4 of them", when referring to buying the other model of BAT amp?

Thanks for the comparison.

With the BAT REX II amps in Mono configuration you can actually take two of the REX II’s and wire them in parallel to a single speaker basically bridging the output of the two amps into a single speaker terminal so that with 4 … 2 on each speaker you end up with 320 watts and twice the current but also twice the number of cables. I’ve never heard of any other amp doing that trick … in fact you can continue to string the amps together in parallel until you run out of power or AC! LOL

That said … with them wired in parallel I’ve heard there is a small decrease in intricate detail but that the soundstage get much larger and the bass attack is substantially better with much better control of the speaker. I’m hoping that a fresh new set of tubes cures me of that desire! :-)

I’m also trying to zero in on exactly how long the system needs to warm up before reaching optimum state. While I’ve had tubes in my preamps many times over the years all the way back to my Counterpoint SA-5000 back in the early 90’s, this is the first time I’ve actually owned tube amps so its an interesting journey. On a couple of tracks I am missing the dynamic and rock solid bass control of the Levinson amps … guess I didn’t realize how good it was but on most of my music the tube magic is slowly drawing me into its dark spell … to be continued after new tubes arrive and are run in properly.

George