Thread: Bel Canto pre 5 preamplifier

John must have got fed up with me moaning about the bc dac 2.7 being touted as a pre amp , yes it can be used as one but in my opinion a de3cent analogue pre amp beats it hands down for musicality

Absolutely thrilled to see the new mains powered pre 5 being launched at $2295 . whether it can compete with the pre 3 vbs remains to be seen but its a real step in the right direction . I get really good organic sound my my pre 3 vbs and use 2 systems with them in

Pre5 Preamplifier - Bel Canto Design

Pre5 Balanced Analog Control Preamplifier
The e.One Pre5 is a highly dynamic fully balanced analog preamplifier. The precise circuitry and compact balanced architecture deliver a pure signal to your amplifier revealing the detail and natural tone of the finest recordings.

Fully Balanced Internal Architecture for Lowest Noise and Distortion
XLR and 4 High Quality RCA Inputs
Independently Buffered XLR and RCA Outputs
Remote Control
Available in Silver or Black Faceplate

All the respect to Bel Canto, they make some fantastic sounding and engineered audio equipment. But this is a preamp back panel. Just not enough input and switching options, especially being it is a balanced architecture design with only one XLR input.

This is a very good pre-amp layout also... But again, what do any of these have to do with Bel Canto and why are they being posted in the Bel Canto thread?

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I had a good chat with Michael from Bel Canto yesterday. The Pre5 will certainly be a great match for their REF600M monoblocks, phono preamp, etc. It helps fill in the product gap better for those that don't want to jump up to the e1X or higher series and is also attractive for people that want to keep the DAC/streaming away from the preamp duties.

I have all of the respect in the world for Bel Canto. Even though I am selling their amplifier it has nothing to do with the quality of Bel Canto products! They manufacture really good gear and are a great value!

Bel Canto REF500S - 250 WPC 8 Ohm, 500 WPC 4 Ohm

Originally Posted by Everest Audio

I had a good chat with Michael from Bel Canto yesterday. The Pre5 will certainly be a great match for their REF600M monoblocks, phono preamp, etc. It helps fill in the product gap better for those that don't want to jump up to the e1X or higher series and is also attractive for people that want to keep the DAC/streaming away from the preamp duties.

fantastic , and it will sound a MILLION times better than putting their dacs into the ref 600 !!!!

Originally Posted by Randy Myers

I have all of the respect in the world for Bel Canto. Even though I am selling their amplifier it has nothing to do with the quality of Bel Canto products! They manufacture really good gear and are a great value!

Bel Canto REF500S - 250 WPC 8 Ohm, 500 WPC 4 Ohm

yes my old bel canto amps are still being bought and sold at good prices well over 10 years later , they are extremely well built , the switches are solid and well made . Yes an audio research ref 6 is better but they are about 16k and as mentioned that buys a lot of bc gear

I used to have a fantastic modwright amp 36.5 and would have another any day , also had the 2 box version . dan gives wonderful support but the bc stuff is smaller and has a very fine remote [ incidentally better than that 16k arc ref imho] 200 step volume control . replaced with a bc pre 3 with a very expensive psu and while its not as good as the 2 box dm its near enough to make it worthwhile and save space and a finer control remote

mod 36.5 by , on Flickr

P1060836 by , on Flickr

I’d love to try the Bel Canto Pre5. Looks like a great little package.

I have absolutely nothing by good things to say about Bel Canto. Great value gear and it appears to be very well made. I have gone back and forth on keeping the Bel Canto and selling the other McIntosh. At this point it is more of a show piece than anything.... I will give it a few days and if the BC has not sold I might switch direction...

mmm been using a bel canto c5i as a pre amp recently. lovely sweet top end and very transparent . i am impressed i must say . they are great vfm second hand . based on this i am tempted to try the pre 5 .

almost 2 years after i posted this thread i hope to get a pre 5 to try. almost no reviews of this pre amp so far