See above. It just sounds right. For $1400 or so used, it's a banging deal. A classic and historical SS unit by virtue of its PS 'chokes', which none had ever done beforein SS, nor since for this price. Ayre had to drop the approach because the cost was 'choking' them.

Missing the smallest bit of CJ 'just sounds right' in the mids. A bit recessed in the vocals, though they float centered as they should with precision image L-to-R. Depth is good, CJ a bit better.

I agree with reviewer below. The Ayre 3 was auditioned in my home for weeks against CJ MV-52, CJ-MV-55, Aragon 8008ST, NAD Silver S250, Bel Canto 200.2, Monarchy SM70 Pro, Quad 303. Preamp/DAC is EAD Encore (or Cal Alpha 24/96 with NOS tubes) speakers are VSA-VR3.5 (89 db) with dual subs (50 hz cross-over and high roll-off for tube amps) andseveral transports from Cal Audio or Squeezebox 2 with high bit ripping and Meridian 518 for jitter reduction and tricks.

The Ayre destroyed them all--except the MV-55 (with SED 1999 EL84, Sylvania 3M-BP 5751 and exotic 6CG7 rolls--All NOS), which was a close call. The Ayre had the midrange character of tubes, transparant highs, superb sound stage and excellent bass. In fact, the reason I kept it where it was because it was better for mixed 2ch/HT and there are no tube hassles, I can leave it on all weekend and I don't worry that my teens will leave it on or overload, as for tubes. BTW, the MV-52 is an upgraded unit from Bill Thalmann (Music Technology in VA) and is a real sweetheart. See my review on that piece. If you have CJ stuff, think about sending to Bill.

I am a tube junky, but, this piece shows that some SS pieces can do the same tricks, with none of the downside of tubes. It's a joy each time I listen and I am amazed how musical, warm, balanced, holographic, detailed and impactful it sounds. Close to perfect, TME (see below)
Yup, Bravo Ayre!

Customer Service

Outstanding! The service tech (Kevin? Mike? I forget) told me that if I had a problem to call and they will stand behind it regardless of warrenty. They had the records that this unit was upgraded to the max in 2004 by original owner. When I shorted the speaker terminals, they walked me over the phone with the way to replace the rail fuse.

Boy, they love thier products and customers, original purchasers or not!

Similar Products Used:

See above

Very musical Articulate Sound Staging Natural Timbre

Are you Kidding? We are talking about Ayre

Ayre is by far one of the best amps out there. I was lucky to get a fully upgraded current model for a steal. I matched it with the K-3x(see reveiw)a match made in heaven. This amp keeps you involved with the source. If you can find one get it. I am telling you with 30 years of experience behind me. I tried alot of whats out there(see below) Ayre is the way to go. The V-3 is what put them on the map. I can see why. If there is one word I would have to use to describe this piece, it would be wicked! Bravo Ayre!

Similar Products Used:

BAT-OK Bryston-OK Conrad Johnson-Well Done Mark Levinson-Well Done(over priced) Audio Research-OK Krell-Junk

What I've already written can go here w/o repeating myself (musical). Very solid build quality, great customer service, truly balanced circuitry as I run it with a fully balanced Pass Aleph P & Meridian 508.20. Bass is not only tight but is more than one note. Does a very good job with all frequencies. If you want a SS amp that can play loud or soft & is more musical than analytical, try & give this a listen.

Only one set of binding posts as I run a true bi-wire set-up using Luminous Audio Renaissance speaker cable. Not the last word in mid range magic but does better than average. Actually, it's much better than average, whatever that is. I'm actually very happy with it.

I thought I'd found the perfect amp when pairing a Pass Aleph 5 with my Aleph P. It was truly a wonderful combination. After having the 5 for a few months I noticed I was listening to more female vocals & jazz than rock & I have more rock than anything. It occurred to me that rock didn't sound quite right with the 5. Selling it was one of the hardest audio decisions I've made but I wanted something that would work with all formats. When I bought the 5 the V-3 was on my short list so I wanted to give it a try. The V-3 I have is ~ 7 years old but had the upgrades done by the factory ~ 6 months before I bought it (I've had it 9 mo). Here's the interesting part. I bought a new set of VR4 Gen III's 4 months ago. It's recommended to break them in at high volume for 100 hrs, so I did just that. The first two playing sessions I smelled an electronic smell & couldn't figure out what it was. In talking to my dealer, he surmised that the Ayre had never been driven very hard & was finishing breaking in. Wow, I bought an almost 7 year old amp that had been babied & pampered. The smell only lasted a few sessions and I subsequently called Ayre out in CO to order a new top plate. There were some superficial marks on it but since the unit looks almost new I wanted to keep it looking that way. In relating my story to the fine folks at Ayre I was told that the unit I had probably had never been run hard & was now very well seasoned. They also said with the upgrades it was probably one of the better sounding V-3's they had ever made. It's nice to know a company thinks highly of its products instead of telling you to trade it in on a newer one. So how does this thing sound? It can rock the house or can play at the lowest possible setting, both with musical results. That's the best thing I can say about this piece. Musical. I don't sit there listening for details, or listen for imaging, or wonder if the tonal representations of the instruments are correct-because it just sounds musical. I've heard 3 shows in the last 6 or so months that I have on CD. Two were acoustic with the exception of the vocals & one was in such a small place they didn't even use a PA. Anyway, when I play my stereo, it transports me back to the shows. In closing, let me say every review you'll ever read is subjective & the best thing you can do is trust your own ears.

Similar Products Used:

Pass Aleph 5, Bryston 4B ST, Adcom 565

Far, far, far better sounding that I had hoped to afford for my home! Super tight bass, liquid midrange (makes guitars sound like magic), incredibly non-harsh treble

Runs hot, slight hum/vibration from unit when in Active mode

I previously had an Acurus A150, being driven by a Pioneer DVD player -> CAL Alpha 24/96 DAC (with Electro Harmonics tubes from amusicdirect.com) -> Acurus RL-11, driving a 1990 pair of Klipsch KG-4’s. The Acurus did a good job – except for some buzzing that first blew up the right channel last year (and was repaired) started happening again this year and blew out the left channel. I decided to look for a new amp. There were several system I have heard that had a certain magic to them: 1) Classe CD + Classe Pre + Class Amp + ProAc Response 1’s 2) Pre Ayre K3 + Ayre V3 + B&W Nautilus 801’s, 3) Ayre K3 + Ayre V5 + Avalon speakers 4) Spectral pre + amp + Audio Physics Virgos Since Spectral amps require a pre, I decided to try: 1) a used 1994 Ayre V-3 2) a Classe 102 3) Sterophile’s Class A amp, the Music Fidelity A3CR I did my first auditioning using New Order’s Technique at the stores. I like this CD for the music, and because much of it is electronic, and I noticed that most “audiophile” system made it sound like crap. They all sounded great there, so I brought them home for a demo. Right off, the Ayre completely killed the Class and Music Fidelity. I was a little surprised: I would have though the Music Fidelity would have performed better, but the Ayre was just SO much better. Interestingly, the Ayre sounded even better with the Transparent Power cable, the Classe sounded a bit better and the Music Fidelity did not have much of a change. The Eagles Hell Freezes Over DVD At home, I auditioned The Eagles Hell Freezes Over DVD. The Music Fidelity had a lot of detail, but was a little grainy and light on the bass. The Classe was more smooth, had more bass than the MF. But the Ayre – WOW! The soundstage extended to the left and right of my speakers, there was much more depth, and the channel separation was so complete, each instrument had its own space! Every movement Joe Walsh made with the guitar fret & strings came across so cleanly it was like being there. On my old Acurus this DVD sounded kind of flat. U2 The Joshua Tree This is one of my favorite albums – but it is a murky recording. My favorite song is Exit. Only on the special systems I mentioned at the top have I both heard and felt the buildup of drums in the middle of the song. With the Ayre, it was clear and almost as moving through my Klipsch as through the Nautilus 801’s

Similar Products Used:

Classe 100w, Music Fidelity 125w

Drives any speaker load with ease, solid bass, dynamic, musical. Not picky about working with other components.

To be picky: No power indicator, power supply makes a little bit of noise. Not a star in the upper frequencies like a Levinson No. 33.

Update: A great amp by a great company. I posted a review on this amp a while back. This is an update -- Ayre stands behind their products and offers excellent service. All other things being equal, I would take the Ayre amp over a competitors. They''re built rock solid, well designed (fully balanced circuitry) and have a great musical sound. I still love this amp. Feel free to email me if you have any questions about my experiences with it: erzielin@hotmail.com

Similar Products Used:

Pass Labs Aleph3 and Aleph 5,Threshold T200, Forte Model 6A, Bryston 3B.

I guess I would pick the superior midrange. One can still hear the emotion the artist put in the recording.

Possibly could have more slam in the bass but I guess a bigger amp would do that.

Expensive yes but does it satisfy? Yes! I recently had the dilemma of wanting (needing?) more power. Should I move up to a big Krell or Mark Levinson? I already had a substantial investment in my first Ayre v3. Could have purchased a pair of Bryston monos for around $4300. Instead I bought another v3 and am verticly bi amping my system. This is my second v3 review (my priveledge I bought 2) and I'll give it a 5 star rating this time. Yes I'm the one that ruined the perfect 5. Great amp!

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Nothing in this league.

Musical reproduction is the task of any amplifier. Musical purity is themotivation for the Ayre V-3 amplifier. The V-3's clean power is harnessed by using a fully-balanced, complementary-symmetry design that utilizes FET's throughout, three total active stages, no negative feedback, and a power supply that provides clean power from the beginning.
The Ayre V-3 is designed around fully balanced circuitry, meaning that
each channel is completely isolated, and immune from typical fluctuations,
protecting the precious original signal, even when operated in single-ended
mode.

Look at how an amplifier creates the signal it sends to your loudspeakers.
it takes the source signal, and sends it through several stages of amplification, each making a new copy of the signal. Conventional designs use many stages to arrive at an adequate final level of amplification. However, with each additional stage, and each new copy, the original signal is slowly degraded
from its original form. With the use of extremely high quality FET transistors
throughout, the number of stages used in the V-3 are minimized to a total of
three simple stages, passing on every detail that was caught in the original
recording.

How about a design principle common to the operation of most amplifiers,
negative feedback? Negative feedback is typically used to correct for errors,
and thus to improve overall specifications. However, this feedback is affected
by individual loudspeakers impedance characteristics, which very greatly from
speaker to speaker, thus making the sonic character of the amplifier inconsistent. The use of newly developed ultra-linear FET's allow the V-3 to operate without any negative feedback, producing sound that is coherent and natural, and consistently such.

Now look closely at what actually drives your loudspeakers, you will find that
it is essentially the output of the power supply, modulated in reference to the input source signal. Now it seems logical to conclude that to attain the cleanest possible reproduction of your music, the output of your power supply must be as clean and noise free as possible. Conventional designs most commonly used today use a first-order capacitor-input filter, resulting in generation of internal noise, due to capacitor charging characteristics from a typical current waveform. The Ayre V-3 uses a second-order, two-stage, inductor-input filter, which is twice as effective as conventional designs. The addition of the inductor before the capacitors provides greatly improved rejection of high-frequency power-line noise, and provides a slow release of current to the filter capacitors, eliminating internally generated power-line noise. The result is pure, clean power to drive your loudspeakers.



Specifications

100 watts per channel @ 8 ohms
200 watts per channel @ 4 ohms

U.S. Retail Price: $3,750

Way Recommended...........!!!!!!!!

Top to bottom fluidity and seamless transitions across tonal ranges.

Too early to tell; none so far.

This amp is all about the music. I traded out my Krell amp/preamp combo and now drive the Ayre direct from a Levinson 39. (After doing the A/B test with a KRC-3 preamp in between.) I am as axcited now about this audio thing as I was when I upgraded my Yamaha reciver to Rotel separates in 1989. I agree with other reviews here - this is a music lover's amp. Fans of house, techno, hip-hop or any other "forward" sound should skip the V-3. Jazz, classical, GOOD rock and blues fans will find what they are looking for here. Am driving Audio Physic Virgos.

Similar Products Used:

Krell FPB 200, 300i

I purchased a Ayre V-3 6 months ago and couldn't be happier with my decision. The V-3 provides holographic sound that is warm and lucious for a 100W solid state amp. Compared it side-by-side with the Krell 250 and the Ayre blew it away. It was like going from black and white to color. Also, the Ayre folks contacted me and are currently performing a free power conditioner upgrade! Never read the full Stereophile review but understand that it was rated "borderline Class A" at the time (late 1996). The knock at the time was that the V-3 lacked some high frequency magic. Since the review, however, Ayre has done two design upgrades to improve things in this area and, if my ears are to be believed, they've fixed this problem. Would love to see an updated Stereophile review - must certainly rate a Class A by now. A zero feedback design with the cleanest power you can imagine. Sounds twice as powerful as my previous Adcomm 5400 125W amp. This amp ROCKS! You'll never believe it's only 100W!

I purchased a used Ayre V-3 about two months ago after testing several amps in the 2K range that I found to be good but not great performers, namely McCormick and Bryston amps. The V-3is everything I could ever ask for in an amp - powerful, dynamic, and exceptionally clean and grainfree for a solid state product. It just has a very natural, unforced sound quality, that I find particularly appealing. If it has one fault, it is that it lacks the bass slam and weight of the killer Krell and Levinson's, but I think you'll have to spend a lot more money to get the kind of sound quality you get from the V-3. In short, an awesome product which gets five stars within its price class. If you can find one, take one home and hear for yourself!