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In use: With a mere 24 steps between mute and full circuit gain of 20dB—due to the rubber-belt transmission the feel of the volume control was a bit spongier and less exacting than the hard-notched input selector—things could get too loud too quickly. With Human Audio's Libretto HD DAC/player outputting a standard 2V via either XLR and RCA, my big 100/180wpc into 8/4Ω ModWright KWA-100SE was nearly useless. One click up and I didn't have quite enough volume. Two clicks were already slightly louder than I wanted much of the time. Three was all I could practically handle for standard entertainment rather than pushy review excess. Where were the fine gradations?


That was with 87dB speakers, a 5.5 x 12m room and 4m+ listening distance. Calling on the lower-gain FirstWatt J2 amplifier helped a lot. I could of course attenuate digitally right in PureMusic but one shouldn't have to. Given many of today's fixed-gain sources which 4V out or more—my Weiss DAC2 does 5.5V, my Burson HA160D up to 10V, the recently reviewed Resonessence Labs Invicta 5V balanced—Steven Leung might consider revisiting the first 10 resistor values on his DACT control to slow down the ramp-up for more useful range. Other than that and personal withdrawal symptoms over the missing remote notwithstanding, everything else was peachy and mechanical self noise was zero.

Upon turn-on the light pipe around the volume control blinks to signify muted outputs during the thermal stabilization protocol. About 45 seconds later the light steadies and the Reference 2 passes signal.


 
Comparisons: Entering and exiting the Reference 2 and LS100 with the same balanced Zu Event cables to minimize variables, the first album to spin up was Jacques Loussier's solo improv on Chopin's Nocturnes [Telarc]. Using tintinnabulation for starters, the two preamps were easy to tell apart. The ModWright had more radiance of harmonic content for greater energy around the tones. The Raysonic sounded a bit more damped. This reminded me of how transformer-coupled power conditioners differ from passive power bars. While the former act as noise killers, the latter tend to sound dynamically freer. The ModWright had greater swell-and-wane micro movements. When Loussier shifted between legato and staccato, the textural transitions from water color to pointillist were more tacit.


On Caravan Sarail's Walking to Kashi—think Jamshied Sharifi's Prayer for the Soul of Layla or One meets the Hadouk Trio meets Tulku—I began to think of these differences in terms of THD distribution. Raysonic's 9-pin valves (12AX7s for dual-stage voltage gain, 12AU7s in the current buffer) were drier. The 8-pin 6SN7s in the ModWright's single voltage gain stage were tonally more attractive and dug deeper into timbre differentiation. To reach for a writerly crutch, the duduk was dudukier, the saxophone saxier. Instead of dynamic contrast, this distinction favoring the LS100 relied on a better contrast of tone colors. Attributes like twangy, nasal, hooded, glassy, reedy, porky and prickly were more distinctive. Some aural MSG (monosodium glutamate, not Madison Square Garden) was at play to enhance flavors.


To my ears the 6H30, 5687 and 12A-series tubes all exhibit less generous valve tone than the octal 6SN7 which routinely shows up as 300B driver. Like vegans who want tofu to taste like meat, audiophiles can be peculiar of course. They look for solid-state that sounds like tubes or vice versa. If the latter is you to some extent, the combination of two stages for voltage gain plus tubes for the output buffer, distortion cancellation from balanced operation and the specific tube types chosen should have your attention on the Raysonic. That said I heard absolutely nothing to suggest that more than twice the funds will buy you admittance to any higher class of performance than the ModWright. On the level? Absolutely. Preferences here should be purely personal. But there's no relocation to a posher part of town involved. Clearly the LS100 isn't the end of the road. Just so the Reference 2 doesn't yet show what might come next. Frank Blöhbaum's preamp for Thorens would and does.

This became even more acute on Dulce Pontes' Momentos where strong tone modulation is the order of the day. Like the Mexican Lila Downs, the Portuguese songstress is very skilled at playing with her fire. One moment her voice burns very brightly, the next a cloud shadows it. Add dynamic inflections and the sense of constant motion is high like wind over water. Here the Reference 2's range of motion was clearly more restricted, the gushing flow tempered. This even extended into dynamic expressiveness. Whilst Raysonic is quick to remind us that they don't use any feedback, this sounded like what increasing feedback on an adjustable valve amp does. I'd felt somewhat similar about the two-box DM36.5 ModWright. Though it did certain things better than the smaller sibling, it fundamentally mirrored how I felt the Raysonic compared to the LS100.


This being the case, there was no reason to drag the bigger ModWright out from under the stairs. The logical next step had to compare the Reference 2 to my transistorized Esoteric C-03 (€10.000 when I bought it but apparently more now due to a disadvantageous ¥-to-€ exchange rate). Set to 24dB of voltage gain to mimic the Raysonic's 20dB, this became a surprisingly close encounter. Ultimately the Esoteric was texturally drier. If on that count the ModWright was tropical, the Esoteric was Nordic, the Raysonic somewhere in Germany.

That the Reference 2 would match the C-03 on resolution and apparent noise floor was surprising. To manage with tubes requires good engineering. Switching back and forth after various tracks left me convinced. The ideal target customer for the Raysonic preamp is someone intrinsically in the solid-state camp who doesn't wish to give up anything on neutrality, bandwidth, operational quiet and magnification power but wants to inject a very modest amount of dewiness for slightly more pronounced textural sculpting. To flog my dead horse once more, the Esoteric naturally retaliates with its very comprehensive remote functionality plus that terrific 3-stage adjustable voltage gain which acts like a tone and transient/bloom analog equalizer... but if one wanted its sound in its most generous setting plus a few degrees of additional silkiness, the C-03 won't comply.


The Reference 2 does. It thus would seem tailormade for valve lovers on the rebound who've tired of deep triode excess, reverted to transistors but miss just a whiff of the old life and wonder how to get it back. A valve amp's interactions with a speaker load are far too unpredictable to make for any generalized recommendation. A valve preamp of Reference 2 cautiousness meanwhile becomes a perfectly strategic tool. It does the desired textural injection and not one iota more. It won't arbitrarily alter other parameters to do with speaker drive, impedance interactions and amplitude shifts.

Conclusion: Fully on par with Esoteric's best transistor amplifier on ambient retrieval, soundstage scale and depth, subjective noise floor and linearity when the Japanese machine is set for highest voltage gain—it gets slimmer and 'faster' in the lower settings—the quad banks of signal path tubes in the Raysonic Reference 2 add a small degree of moistness or silken glow. This doesn't affect color temperature, tonal balance or low-level separation. It operates solely on textures. This then is mostly an advanced solid-stage sound with a very mild dose of thermionic flavor. It's similar to what an excellent digital deck with a dual-differential 6H30 output stage contributes to an all-transistor rig. Given Raysonic's track record one should expect good reliability and longevity. The brand adjustment to make is simply upstairs in the head. This no longer is transitional or high-value hifi. It's gone mainstream establishment now to play the expensive refined leagues and compete at a higher level. If this extends to Raysonic's other Reference Series components, the gloves have come off. Another capable challenger has been admitted to the 10K club.
Quality of packing: One carton contains both components which are completely and securely encased in clamshell hard foam.
Reusability of packing: A few times.
Ease of unpacking/repacking: A cinch.
Condition of component received: Flawless.
Completeness of delivery: Perfect.
Human interactions: Good.
Pricing: Expensive.
Final comments & suggestions: Lacks remote control, fixed outputs, HT bypass, balance and headphone output. Lacks display for numerical confirmation of volume setting. Level control is limited to 24 steps. Sources with fixed high gain and/or power amps with high input sensitivity could encounter limited usable volume range.

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