I heard that Norah Jones bought a Leben CS-300X from In Living Stereo in NYC some years ago. Great choice, it's hard to beat a CS-300X, Norah!
Norah's an amazing musician, and I love her music. It doesn't surprise me at all that Norah bought a Leben CS-300X. It's a great sounding amplifier in audiophile terms, it's a musician's amplifier that plays music really well, and it is drop dead gorgeous looking. Musicians know what's worth buying.
The Leben CS-300X is the sort of amplifier you can have in your living room and when visitors see it, you feel good about it when they say "Now that's a beautiful looking amplifier!" Pride of ownership in spades.
Above: The NEW Leben CS-300XO "Hugs & Kisses" Edition Integrated Amplifier.
Above: Plenty of inputs for every source! Check out the gold-plated screws securing the vented top cover.
If you haven't read my "Today's Fresh Catch" post about the new Leben CS-300XO you can read it HERE. Essentially, the new CS-300XO is similar in design to the previous CS-300X, but has been improved in performance due to the addition of paper-in-oil bypass capacitors.
The new Leben CS-300XO is a real looker in a classy sort of way. I think CS-300XO is the classiest looking integrated amplifier you can buy today. The gold faceplate with green highlights, the sexy gold rear panel, the textured black vented top plate held in place by gold-plated screws, and the solid walnut side cheeks, all work together to make the Leben CS-300XO look really sharp. I'm impressed by its good looks every time I see it.
Not only is the CS-300XO gorgeous to behold, it has lots of thoughtful features, like the included isolation footers, a balance control, six inputs for all your sources, a bass boost switch, an impedance adjustment switch that covers a range 4 / 6 / 8 Ohms, which can accommodate just about every loudspeaker you'll encounter. There's no 16 Ohms setting, but I've found the CS-300XO plays music beautifully with my 16 Ohm vintage Altecs when it is set to 8 Ohms, so all's good there. I'm not a headphones listener, but people who are tell me the headphones circuit is exceptionally fine-sounding.
From a design standpoint, the CS-300XO is a push-pull EL84 vacuum tube integrated amplifier with an output power of 15 muscular vacuum tube watts. There are four JJ Electronic EL84 (6BQ5) output valves, and the input driver valves are Sovtek 12AX7WAs. I can get live-like SPLs with the volume control set around the 9 o'clock position, so there's plenty of headroom for more SPLs if you need it.
As an aside, I'm always tempted to try different combinations of vacuum tubes in amplifiers, so I tried swapping out the stock Sovtek 12AX7WAs for some NOS GE 5751s just to hear what happens. It turns out the 5751s were a bust, and the CS-300XO sounded a lot better with the stock Sovteks. Leben really has done a superb job of voicing the CS-300XO with its stock tube complement, so no need to do any tube rolling with the CS-300XO. Just plug it in, turn it on, and enjoy!
I've been letting the CS-300XO accumulate run-in hours in my vintage Altec A5 Voice of the Theater loudspeakers based audio-visual system. The CS-300XO still doesn't have the 100 hours or so on it that I usually considers to be the fully run-in point, but it was sounding so good I wanted to transfer it into my office system for some music on vinyl listening.
Above: The Leben CS-300XO in my office system.
I've been looking forward to giving the CS-300XO a listen in my office system with the matching Leben RS-30EQ phono preamplifier, and the newly released Leben CS-60T step-up transformer (more HERE on the CS-60T).
Above: CS-60T SUT (left) and RS-30EQ phono preamplifier (right).
Above: Closeup of the Leben moving-coil cartridge step-up transformer. It's a beauty and sounds great!
Above: Leben CS-300XO integrated amplifier.
I really love my office system with my vintage Altecs that were custom-made for Conductor Leopold Stokowski way back when, and that Frederik Carøe and I built custom Duelund CAST tinned-copper crossovers for in The Duelund-Altec Project – Dare to Dream! article for Positive Feedback.
Above: Duelund CAST tinned-copper crossovers in the Stokowski Altec loudspeakers.
My Altecs sound amazing with the Duelund CAST crossovers. To connect everything together I'm using Duelund DCA16GA tinned-copper wire for speaker cables, and Duelund DCA16GA interconnects. The Duelund 16GA tinned-copper wire is a really good match for vintage Altec loudspeakers, and I use it in all three of my vintage Altec-based audio systems.
Above: Vinyl source for my listening session.
My restored vintage Thorens TD-124 turntable, with the superb Murasakino Musique Analogue ‘Sumile’ MC phonograph cartridge and the lovingly crafted artisanal Acoustic Revive RHS-1 headshell, mounted on the Schick tonearm.
Above: Murasakino Musique Analogue ‘Sumile’ MC phonograph cartridge mounted on artisanal Acoustic Revive RHS-1 headshell.
Let's do a little listening, shall we?
Above: the view from my listening seat in my office - nice!
If you guessed that the first album I listened to was Norah Jones’s first album, Norah Jones, you're exactly right!
Above: Norah Jones - Come Away With Me.
My album is from the Norah Jones box set that Chad Kassem did for his Analogue Productions label some years ago.
Above: The Analogue Productions Norah Jones box set.
There's a performance boost when you combine components from the same manufacturer, and the combination of the Leben CS-300XO integrated amplifier, Leben RS-30EQ phono preamplifier, and the Leben CS-60T step-up transformer are really superb together.
Norah Jones sounded right in the room with me, with big billowing natural-sounding tonality, and oodles of good emotional vibes. Norah's voice was just gorgeous, warm and natural, complementing perfectly the new "Hugs & Kisses" persona of the new Leben CS-300XO integrated amplifier with its liquid, silky, sexy, musical sounding oil coupling caps.
This is how I want my vinyl playback to sound: lots of musical information recovered, warmish and flesh & blood natural, dynamic, a big spacious presentation, with realistic timbral textures of instruments, and tonally saturated tone color. Just gorgeous!
Above: Norah Jones Covers of Johnny Cash, Patsy Cline, Fats Domino, Bob Dylan, and others!
After melting into my listening seat while listening to Norah Jones's Come Away With Me, I could barely get up and put on another album. I chose Norah's Covers album from the box set for my next listen.
I love to hear an artist’s take on other artists’ great songs, as there's that familiar beloved song, but now infused with the artistry of Nora Jones, along with all her talented backing musicians.
The Leben Trio was really singing on the big Altecs as I listened to Covers, and I felt like I was in the studio with Norah in the finest goosebumps fashion.
Norah's voice was gorgeous and emotionally riveting, the instruments sounded like they were about ten feet from me, with fully resolved timbral textures, gorgeous tone, vivid imaging presence, and man, what a treat!
Above: the new Leben CS-300XO integrated amplifier. $5995 USD.
Well I'm impressed. The CS-300XO is sounding superb paired with its intended RS-30EQ phono preamplifier and CS-60T SUT. And it's not even fully run-in yet. This is a super easy-to-recommend combination of Leben kit to all of you Leben enthusiasts out there.
I'll continue to collect listening impressions with different albums as I continue to get some more run-in time on the CS-300XO, and will report back.
Above: The new Leben CS-60T step-up transformer. $2795 USD.
There will be much more to come on the new Leben CS-300XO integrated amplifier and the new Leben CS-60T SUT as I get better acquainted with them.
The Leben CS-300XO integrated amplifier is $5995, the RS-30EQ phono stage is $3995, and the CS-60T SUT is $2795. So the total for this complete set of amplification components is $12,785, which I think is a good value for its level of performance.
Hint: You may want to get your order in for these before the full feature reviews come out in Positive Feedback or you might end up waiting for a while.
As always, thanks for stopping by, and may the tone be with you!
