Greece. The doyen of democracy. The home of Homer. The song of Socrates. Anyone with enough time on their hands could come up with an A-Z of matched pairs to reflect ancient Greece's past glories. Wherein lies the rub. They're long past. Today, Greece's economic standing in the EU is quite inglorious. Like its other citizens, hifi makers struggle to survive, particularly those which don't pursue the one-percenters who are always flush no matter what. Stratos Vichos' Lab 12 company isn't an Ypsilon Audio or Aries Cerat.


As their above Munich 2016 exhibit shows with its Ikea not Ikandi tables, his comfort zone is a lot more blue collar than white. Even the exhibitor lady wears real-people clothes, not ridiculous designer pumps and skimpy skirts. As Stratos put it, "we find ourselves in a period where we need promotion from a well-known site with a review from a reputable reviewer". Unlike his landsmen at TruLife Audio whose present range venerates Athena, Zeus & kin, the Lab 12 catalogue contains no reference to Greece's legendary past. There's only the Gordian power conditioner which knots an implied connection to Alexander the Great.

In SET terms, it's a bit of an impostor because it's neither true triode nor direct heated. But prospective buyers wouldn't give a toss. They very much would, however, over replacement tube costs. A Russian Tung-Sol KT150 can be had for ~€80. Many of the posh DHT start at 10 times that, then go up. In fact, one could waste the Suono's total tag of €2'200 on glass alone when dealing with upscale DHT amps. Again, the Suono isn't about passé glorification of Western Electric NOS - new-old stock to the uninitiated, signifying tubes often 50 years old which have never been used but whose rarity inflates prices. It's about current production valves of average cost; and how to squeeze the most from solitary output bottles which must operate in class A by design, hence conduct always at full power. It should go without saying that the output transformers won't be exotic Japanese issue from Hashimoto, Kondo or Tango; and that their cores won't be FineMet, amorphous or Cobalt/Nickel, then get wound up with aged silver. Again, the Suono is for folks who wouldn't know these pretensions, ambitions and secret handshakes. No copper chassis either or chrome-plated tube chimneys. No inch-thick faceplates or Japanese Yamamoto meters. Its VU meters are sourced from Taiwan's Nissei instead, part #TR-57. But it is a pure class A amp, a pure tube amp and a manual bias circuit with no negative feedback. Plus, fascia and transformer caps can be had in matte black, gloss white or a custom colour. Viva la proletariat?