Just pulled the trigger on a LaRocco Pocket Reference

[ephemere]

I've been looking for my first "good" amp, and after perusing the forum for a while I decided to pre-order the new Pocket Reference over at the ipodstudio group buy. The new Pocket Reference is much smaller than the old one, I believe employing largely the same circuit but this time with surface mount components.

This amp will be spending 75% of its time as a home amp in my main rig, 20% of its time moving from room to room hooked up to a wireless squeezebox, and 5% of its time traveling. So it needed to be good enough to act as my main home amp, but small enough to move around easily. It also needed to have rechargable batteries with a built-in trickle charger. That requirement knocked out a lot of nice amps, such as the SR-71, but I am a creature of convenience and really don't want to have to open the thing up more than once a year or so. As far as I can tell, these requirements left only the following candidates, all around the the same price range:

1. LaRocco Pocket Reference (to be released)
2. Ray Samuels Hornet (to be released)
3. HeadAmp AE-1
4. Xin SuperMacro-3
5. Rockhopper PPA Home/Portable (but I decided it's too big)

As far as I can tell, there's a lot of debate about which of these is better than the others and so forth. Reading all the reviews and comments about these various models, I can tell you that they all seem like wonderful products, and I'm sure I would be happy with any of them. Ultimately, I favored the PR because of its features: RCA inputs, 1/4" output, variable bass boost, and capacity to roll op amps. The bass boost especially is an attractive feature because I'll be using this with the K501, ER4P, and perhaps the SA5000. (The PR is even said to drive the K1000 well to moderate volumes.) Also, the reviews of the "old" PR seemed to match my own taste for clear, detailed amplifiers without too much warmth. My understanding is that the PR circuit sounds similar to a PPA, and is much like a PPA without the differential output.

Anyhow, I'm pretty excited to try it out. Now all I need to do is wait for LaRocco to finish the first production run.

 

[appar111]

So did Larocco finish the first production run? I saw on ipodstudio.com that you can get one for around $382. From all accounts, it looks like it's readily available through their website. Is it not released yet, and if so, when's it due out?

I was seriously looking at it as an option (along w/ the SR-71, AE-1, RA-1) but found a good deal on one of the others, so I've gone that route.

 

[C38368]

I was just taking a look at that... does it only have RCA inputs?

*ponder*
On second thought, I suppose that doesn't really matter in light of adapters, but still...

 

[appar111]

Seems that way... which is one of the reasons I wasn't sure if I wanted it. I know that they made it smaller, but there aren't any pics of this new smaller design. I did like the variable bass boost option, and the 1/4" headphone jack, but without being able to see this new, smaller version, and especially if it's not ready yet, then I wasn't sure if I wanted to take the almost $400 leap..

 

[Jahn]

Please do share your impressions once it arrives!