On even happier smoke rings, if I sat in Cap'n Picard's chair over in the LTA design lounge to say 'make it so', I'd look at an XLR4 output even if just of the convenience sort. Some of us are invested in excellent aftermarket balanced headphone cables. Such a port would accommodate them. That and a standing 'mute' sign were the only two mini niggles I scared up to earn today's meagre critic's keep. I loved Velo's compact footprint, low mass and clean industrial design. I thought the temporary light show during volume changes brilliant, the solitary solid volume light perfectly visible from the seat even in bright daylight. Making the linear PSU optional helps fasting wallets gather a second wind. Sticking to common not boutique glass puts more extensive tube rolling within reach and keeps retubing affordable. Utter absence of noise and turn-on/off transients speaks to proper engineering. The metal not plastic membrane IR wand is a cut above.

Drew Pritchard of the eponymous UK antique warehouse who previously had a showroom inside Liberty's of London, is the subject of the Salvage Hunters YouTube series [at right with sidekick Tee]. It accompanies him on his frequent road trips to chase sellable finds in salvage yards, schools, stately homes and factories across Blighty and Beyond. He prefers unadorned well-made antique and vintage furniture and fixtures not slickly refurbished already. Simplicity of lines and industrial honesty too surround Velo. It's neither Dubai bling nor overkill of any kind. If Drew were a hifi nutter, he'd approve. As is, he already picked up a dusty pair of original Quad ELS-57 for £150 during one of those inventory-chasing runs just because he liked their looks; not because he knew what they were or worried about them actually working. I can imagine people looking and touching Velo with similar appreciation well before any sound happens. And even that is simplicity itself unlike so much modern networked hifi. Forget having to bias these tubes. It's plug'n'play all the way.

Can you mock up Velo's ZOTL effect some other way? A good DSD DAC which resamples all PCM can have a smaller dose of similar attributes. Against those I've heard, Velo with the LPS+ was capable of more snap, crackle and pop. There's obviously a plethora of traditional tube preamps. Does ZOTL transfer into their midst with as much of a gap as David Berning's rare Siegfried did back when I gave up on classic speaker amps with tubes? I wouldn't know. I've given anything valved short shrift other than holding on tight to my direct-coupled 300B Vinnie Rossi linestage. I don't use the valves in my iFi DAC. They lay it on too thick. Velo's don't. It's not because its tubes are anything special. Their MO is.

It brings us full circle with the zero hysteresis output transformer-less concept which aside from being in Berning kit licenses to just LTA. Such exclusivity from novel tech could support d'Agostino-type overkill packaging and High Street pricing. But Mark Schneider remains a man of the people. He made Velo just as big and heavy as its innards dictate, as simple as common usage warrants but no simpler. It means three RCA inputs and two outputs to biamp or sub. It's a very sensible package within reach of more buyers. Its performance is an equal opportunity boss between preamplitude and headfi. Neither is superior nor inferior. It's a nicely balanced proposition.

To escalate resolution beyond Velo should take upgrading to the $3'700 MZ3 or even costlier Z10e. Raw resolving power is the one area where Velo slightly trailed my domestic kit. But that's persnickety parsing within a much bigger picture. Also, it overlooks what rolling glass might still do. The optional LPS+ proved as quiet in use and felt equally well put together. Whilst I tried my smaller FiiO and Meze headphones, my favourite Velo mate was Final's D8000 with Beautiful Audio's comfort wrap from New Zealand. That scaled up better. It made for a really quite fabulous combo which even fatter wallets could happily retire with. Just keep away from Susvara and their ilk. They want more than 0.35wpc/30Ω.

Searching for a velo word I might have missed, I came across velouté, "a savory sauce made from roux and light stock. It's one of the mother sauces of French cuisine listed by chef Auguste Escoffier in the early 20th century along with espagnole, tomato, béchamel and mayonnaise or hollandaise. Velouté is French for velvety." That makes for a fitting conclusion when fine hifi is like fine dining. It goes beyond soup 'n' sandwich basics. It relies on evolved taste and curated appreciation. It's an indulgent luxury. And when we read of mother sauces, it's surely true that tubes are one of our hobby's; and that tubes without a classic steel-core output transformer between themselves and our transducers but not exactly nothing like classic OTL are a rare variety that deserves its very own name: ZOTL for small RF air-core impedance down-converters creating the handshake between high-Ω tubes and low-Ω loads. Despite a mouthful only a mother could love, come to mama? To this fully converted solid-state man, ZOTL and grounded-grid glass are the only two types I'd still use. In that context, US-made Velo is probably the most affordable option I'm aware of. It's something to shout about whenever the subject of advanced tubes, headphones and preamps comes up.