Lecson Quattra Integrated Amp

I found this review on another of Colin Wonfor's designs, also stolen.

Lecson Quattra
Integrated Amp Reviewed

By:
HomeTheaterReview.com, February 13, 1991 

It's worth mentioning
here that the Lecson has a strange 'volume distribution' throughout the arc of
the control knob. You're offered a lot of travel for fine level adjustment from
7 o'clock until 2 or 3 o'clock. Then the amp kicks in with a wallop just when
you were about to write it off as gutless. Just make note of this as 'normal',
so you won't worry during bouts of loud playback when you may be used to amps
which pack most of their punch between the 10 and 2 o'clock points.

Matched to a speaker
which will exploit the power capabilities without asking for ackney-levels of
subsidy, the Lecson is a smooth operator. Indeed, it may be too smooth for some,
as if the opportunities for nasties to appear have been banished. In most cases
this manifests itself as a sweetening of the sound, a freedom from sibilance
and a removal of 'edginess'. But the effect, not quite a filtering of the
sound, means slightly less transparency than is available from other amplifiers
in its price category. The obvious alternatives, less forgiving but more open,
include Musical Fidelity and Mission offerings, both of which seem to pursue
true audiophile goals rather than an easier, more universal
applicability.In real terms, it
means that the Lecson is less sniffy about the gear with which it's partnered,
and systems building with this amp at the core will be an easy task.

On the other hand,
the amplifier will show its limitations more readily when the owner moves down that
perilous upgrade path, a Mission Cyrus with the extra power supply, for
example, being able to drive speakers way beyond its price category with
aplomb,or a Musical Fidelity
offering of like price producing not just power but more finely-etched detail.
What saves the Lecson in this company -- four amps aside -- is its
near-holographic imaging and a consistency from top to bottom which really does
compensate for the softness. 

Then we get to the
wiring option. And here's where the trade-offs enter. With the amp run as a
45-watter, refinement is marginally compromised, but the sense of greater
dynamics is undeniable. Subjective loudness remains the same, but the Lecson
appears to show less strain when the swings vary at their widest. This was Screen
Innovations Releases a eries of particularly well-illustrated by the deep
percussion on the introduction of Willy de Ville's 'Assassin of Love' (the single
mix, rather than the truncated LP cut). In 45W mode, the snap (or should I say
'thud'?) had greater impact than it did in bi-amp mode. So, too, were sharply
plucked or punchy notes in the mid and upper ranges – hot brass, electric
guitar, rapid synth activity -- in possession of greater attack. But the bi-wiring
offered much which wasn't available in full-range mode. Transparency increased
markedly, to a degree comparable to
moving from a good cable to a great one, and mid-band clarity benefitted
enormously.

Listen to the Judds
or Emmylou Harris or Nanci Griffith or any clear-voiced yahoo warbler through
the Lecson in bi-amp mode vs full range and you'll hear something akin to a
change of microphones.

But, and this isn't
meant to pee on Lecson's parade, the best sound was a compromise smack in the
middle.

Running off the 45W
taps in bi-wire mode, I heard sound with the best balance of both typologies'
virtues and weaknesses. I tell you this because it means that the Lecson comes
'standard' with three levels of operation.

Depending on your
tastes and priorities, you can run this amp for maximum dynamics at the expense
of transparency, for maximum transparency but with slight compression, or -- in
bi-wired mode – somewhere in-between.

In absolute terms,
the Lecson is a fine example of the genre but not one which 'blows away' direct
rivals. What it offers, though, in 'quattra' mode is an option that none of its
rivals can proffer, and those who wish to exploit or will benefit from four-amp
need look no further than this product for optimising a speaker with twinned
terminals.

Innovative ? You bet.
Even if I didn't like the sound -- which I most certainly do -- I'd give Lecson
the nod for showing that novelty needn't mean specious crap sprinkled with
fairy dust. This is a real alternative to conventional amplifiers, devoid of
any con-artistry.

Now, when do we get
the ribbed cylindrical power amp?