Intro
Contents
Is this the best integrated amplifier we have had in our listening room? Perhaps… And have we already revealed the outcome of the review? Yeah… as a matter of fact, we did. Anyway, we hope you’ll stick around for the rest of the review of this MOON 700i V2. There is much more to tell about it
Who reads Alpha Audio on a regular basis, this brute has been in a review before. In fact the review of the Gauder Akustik Arcona 100. A hefty floorstander that you do not just drive with a tube amplifier. Unless you know what you are doing. But with this MOON it all played without a hitch. And – as it turns out later – that’s quite an achievement.
MOON 700i V2
Let’s first see what we have placed on our audio-rack. If you like puristic, you will appreciate the MOON 700i V2. This is a pure analogue beast. With 175 watts per channel in 8 Ohm and 350 watts in 4 Ohm there is enough power. By the way, we’re talking about a class AB design.
Now, power doesn’t tell the whole story. Current, capacity and design say just as much. So let’s take the hood off.
Under the hood we don’t see – except for two gigantic toroidal transformers – a huge amount of reserve-energy for the output stage. We find 4 x 8200 uF of capacity per side. That can be a conscious choice (speed). Designers have a lot of choice here: one gigantic capacitor. Several small ones, a few medium ones, et cetera. Each design has advantages and disadvantages, as we learned from designers in the market. The most important thing is balance in the design. And that’s taken care of with this 700i by MOON, because we didn’t have the idea at all that we emptied the output stage. On the contrary: it kept on going on the Gauders. And on our Focals idem.
On the back of the 700i V2 we see a set of inputs on the left and right side. Completely separated because of the dual mono design. There is – silly enough – one balanced input. The rest is single ended. Now it is completely dependent on the amplifier design which sounds better, but we would like to see a bit more flexibility. All in all there are four sets single ended and thus one balanced. Finally, there is a monitor loop.
All electronics are hidden in a nicely designed housing. Our model is completely black. But there is also the choice between silver and dual tone, where we find dual tone the most successful.
We can appreciate the design of the 700i V2. With a few functional buttons on the front and a large volume control, guessing is not necessary. There is a button for input, volume, on/off, mute, display, monitor and setup. Of course MOON also delivers a – beautiful! – remote control.
