PARASOUND (based in San Francisco, manufacturing in Taiwan) has not always had representation down here, but have built a reputation for high-end sound uality amplifier products at an 'adffordable' and/or 'high value' cost.

Large part of this, no doubt, has been their 30 year association with John Curl as a consultant design engineer. (John Curl is well known to many audio enthusiasts from 1980s-90s for designwork with Mark Levinson, Sota, MoFi, Wilson & his own Vendetta Research brand.)

Not sure about this product, but J Curl's designs for Parasound have featured 'direct coupling' (no capacitors in the 'signal path') & no output inductors.

Positive Feedback (Maurice Jeffries) reviews the PARASOUND HINT 6, priced at US$2995, which features:

• Burr Brown 'analog resistor ladder volume control'
• ESS Sabre32 Reference DAC (ES9018K2M)
• MM/MC Phono stage
• High current Headphone amplifier
• RCA & balanced XLR inputs & outputs
• Bass & Treble controls with bypass
• Remote Control
• 0.5W Standby power
• 160 Wpc into 8 ohms
• John Curl designed power amplifier section
• 'High bias class A/AB' operation
• 0.5W Standby power
• Preamp bypass

" ... micro-dynamic traction, instrumental texture, and top-to-bottom dynamic punch..." (with Magnepan 1.7i loudspeakers)

DarkLantern blog - darklanternforowen.wordpress.com

Michael Lavorgna (TWITTERING MACHINES) reviews the PARASOUND Hint 6:

" Its sonic traits transferred to whichever speaker I decided to listen through. Big, crisp, bold, and rather beautiful. "
(With DeVore O/93s and Golden Ear BRX loudspeakers.)

Compared to the HEGEL H95:

" In general, I’d say that the Hegel sounds a bit sweeter and smaller than the Parasound... That being said, the Hegel did not produce the same sense of nearly overwhelming dynamics, drama, and scale of the HINT 6. "


Now, arguably is a never-more-affordable time to buy an integrated amplifier - plenty of watts, headphone amplifier, MM/MC phono stage & DAC built-in.

DarkLantern blog - darklanternforowen.wordpress.com