yup, that's a tube buffer stage. shows up on
http://cattylink.com/ for $100 (plus shipping, of course). i have an ase z-man tube buffer stage that i like to use, so this item seems quite interesting to me. (i actually offered the seller $150, shipping included, when he had these f/s a few months ago, but he respectfully declined.) i have used the z-man between tuner & preamp, & between cdp & preamp w/nice results - warms up the sound, w/o any loss of detail. i presently use a z-man between a creek obh-12 passive pre & my amp(s). i am supposed to get my melos preamp back from melos w/a new tube wolume pot upgrade. i will likely pull the z-man from its present location, & re-install it between tuner or dac & preamp...
doug s.