Well, I replaced my ARC LS25 with Gary Dodd's battery preamp, and whoa nelly!!!
To say that the Dodd pre is a bargain is a ridiculous understatement.
To say my system sounds incredible is insufficient.
Once again, I maintain the the HT3 is an amazing speaker, as neutral as it gets, and able to leap tall buildings in a single bound!
The Dodd is mated to a Bryston 4BSST - this is the fifth preamp I've tried with this amp - and wow!!! I thought the amp was a log, but not anymore!
Here's the story - the Dodd is VERY revealing of tube changes, and I have a pair of NOS Siemens in there now. MY wife!!!!!! walked by the speakers the other night while they were singing, and she started singing too. She said, and I kid you not, "THIS SOUNDS WONDERFUL". She does not care for my "hobby" in the least. My son came home from college on break and we had music playing with dinner. He turned up the volume - the wife said no - and he looked at her and said, "this sounds REALLY GREAT, I've never heard this disc sound SO GOOD". My son thinks my "hobby" is ridiculous, BTW.
So two nonbelievers think everything sounds great - and they are right! These were totally unsolicited comments, BTW. I didn't ask them what they thought - these remarks came from their casual observations, and I was floored (but tried really hard not to show it!).
So I have this to say - the HT3 can sound like ANYTHING. I was having doubts about their imaging - but the Dodd shows them to be positively holographic. If you think the bass is too lean or too boomy - look upstream. If the highs are rolled or too harsh - look upstream.
I think I have a "world class system" right now -
SimAudio Supernova CDP
Dodd battery pre
Bryston 4BssT
Salk HT3
I don't (honestly) know if I've ever heard better, and I think the room is the limiting factor now. Gotta go now, my Salks are singing and I need to listen.
