Audiolab 6000A Integrated Amplifier

An amplifier remains the beating heart of any high-performance audio system, a truly versatile integrated amp needs to cover many bases – digital and analogue sources, wireless connectivity for portable devices, a phono stage to cater for vinyl playback, amplification for headphones as well as speakers… That’s a lot to pack in, whilst keeping performance high and the price tag affordable – and yet, that’s exactly what the 6000A delivers.   To incorporate all this functionality, there must be compromise under the lid, right? Wrong. The 6000A’s lead electronics designer is Jan Ertner – the same man responsible for the 8300A, as well as many other award-winning audio components over the years. When challenged to deliver 6000A at such a low price point, Jan returned to the technologies he implemented in the 8300A and painstakingly redeveloped them, whilst adding high-quality digital circuitry to the mix. The result is a new-generation amplifier evolved from the architecture of its pricier sibling, delivering exceptional sound quality alongside those flexible facilities.   Much effort has been made to ensure the 6000A’s digital circuitry delivers the level of quality one might expect of a high-performance standalone DAC. As ever, Audiolab has turned to the ES9018 Sabre32 Reference chip family to perform D/A conversion, utilising ESS Technology’s 32-bit HyperStream architecture and Time Domain Jitter Eliminator to deliver ultra-low noise and high dynamic range.   The 6000A’s discrete Class AB power amp stage delivers 50W per channel into eight ohms, with a maximum current delivery of 9 Amps into difficult loads. The output stage of the discrete power amp circuits uses a CFB (Complementary Feedback) topology, ensuring superior linearity and excellent thermal stability, as the idle current is kept independent of the temperature of the output transistors. A substantial 200VA toroidal transformer, followed by 4x15000uF reservoir capacity (60000uF in total), helps the amp to maintain firm control of the music whilst enabling excellent dynamic range.   Gain (max.) – 8dB (Line) / 55dB (Phono MM) m Input Sensitivity – 720mV (Line, Volume = 0dB) / 3.1mV (Phono MM, Volume=0dB) Input Impedance – 10K (Line) / 47K//100pF (Phono MM)Total Harmonic Distortion (THD)< 0.0004% (Line, 1KHz @ 2V, Volume = 0dB) Frequency Response – 20Hz-20kHz ( /-0.1dB) Output Voltage – 2.3V max. (Volume = 0dB) Output Impedance – 120Ω Signal-to-Noise Ration (S/N) – > 110dB (Line, A-weighted) / >76dB (Phono MM, A-weighted)   DAC D to A converter – ES9018K2M Total Harmonic Distortion (THD) – < 0.0006% (1kHz @ 0dBFS) Output level (0dBFS, 1KHz) – 2.05V Max. Sampling Frequency – 192kHz Signal-to-noise ratio (S/N) – > 112dB (A-weighted) Digital Filters – Fast Roll-off , Slow Roll-off , Minimum Phase   Power Amplifier Section Gain – 29dB Rated Max. Power Output – 2 X 50W (8Ω, THD<1%) / 2 X 75W (4Ω, THD<1%) Frequency Response – 20Hz-20kHz ( /-0.3dB) Input Sensitivity – 720mV