Mcintosh is self biased, doesn’t matter

Mcintosh is very mid centric I’m not surprised to hear that!

Yes

If using rca the signal is lower so raise the volume to 2pm on mcintosh, there’s no rule, unity is ok for most but going past it is absolutely ok

No I’m sorry I haven’t but I hear they are almost as good as good lions. Audio research guys swear by them

Gold lions are silent

It will improve beyond your wildest expectations,, in every way. Use the volume control on CD player and leave the volume on mha200 at 12 and never touch it.

Oh ok, never tried nos tubes in this amp. I find new gold lions a perfect replacement for the stock tubes in all my mcintosh gear, makes everything sound so much better.

I’m not a tech but if he’s getting major rfi audible interference from a device that I can use beside my modem and other gear and cell phone without any then to me his unit is defective. I couldn’t really say specifically in what way but the mcintosh tech who opens it up will find out. I had a...

Mine was close to my modem and streamer and dac with no rfi issues whatsoever, I would suspect based on that, that you have a defective unit. Exchange it Ps. If you use crappy rca’s it could maybe be the cause, try balanced or better rca’s before exchanging

Ah ok, it’s fine then.

Try not to max out the gain… go to 1pm it’s way enough gain and sweet spot for noise.

If Mcintosh had just released an integrated amp that had this type of gain/volume system it would be a disaster.. you either make an integrated amp with a useable volume knob or you make a power amp for use with a pre, If you want your integrated amp to double as a power amp like my Kora you...

Of course that’s an option but it was implemented so poorly that’s it’s no fun to use especially again coming from the headphone world with our normally well thought out volume control like as an example on my feliks euphoria, a real pleasure to use and to be able to fine tune the volume.

The headphone market is different, most of us don’t have a spare pre lying around to use for a headphone system, I know I don’t. If I wasn’t using a streamer with volume control I’d be forced to go buy a pre amp? And then why did they make a pre amp section in the amp that then needs another pre...

I own one, it’s a very good headphone amp.

Deliberate? Why would they do that? We’ve all used headphone amps for years, they all have volume control because they’re all essentially integrated amps.. mcintosh uses 2 tubes for the pre amp yet they expect you to use a pre amp with the amp… that is questionable for sure. It’s the worst...

It’s major in the sense that you can’t really use the amp without a pre. You get rewarded when you do that sonically as well so it’s a win win. In a pinch use the volume control on Roon app. I set the volume (gain) to a hair past 12

On the 100ohm setting the Utopia has more sub bass then I’ve ever heard it make. It’s like a new headphone, make sure you use a pre amp or volume control somewhere other then the unit itself

I’m not able to break it down scientifically but the Utopia is rated at 80 ohms so using the 100-250 ohm as opposed to the 35-100 ohm isn’t going to do any damage, it truly sounds much better using the 100-250 selection for me.

It’s a holo spring lvl3 kte that I’ll be sending in to upgrade for a holo may kte as soon as I can. Sounds sublime

Just got mine, using Utopia to start, sounds much fuller with the 100-200ohm selected. Wow, utopias have never ever sounded better.. If it’s this good out of the box I think it’s a keeper. Also using it with a Roon nucleus and using the Roon app to adjust volume, I keep it a hair past 12 on...

A dap is all I use for 7200, they sound amazing with little power.

No comparison to any focal, or beyer. It’s a great headphone for electronic music.

Blue and red seemed the same to me. White has slightly better bass.