Linear Tube Audio (LTA) appeared in a few places around the Florida Audio Show. The US-based company partnered with Spatial Audio and their open baffle M3 Sapphire Loudspeakers on the sixth floor, but the real newsy-ist news comes in the form of the LTA UltraLinear Power Amplifier which only recently became available to the public a few months ago.
The Class A/B LTA UltraLinear may only be rated at 20 watts a channel but if its anything like the Z10e Integrated we currently have in for review, that’s a lot of proverbial punch for pushing transducers. The Z10 (non-e, $4,900) on display in suite 605 made the M3s ($4.2k) sing without hesitation. Continuing on with my “gotcha” reference request of recent grammy sweeper Billie Eilish, the LTA DJ did produce in the form of Ocean Eyes in a high resolution format. The sometime tricky bass from the Spatial speakers was not only direct and tight, but right… right?
Fronted by the Lampizator Amber 3 DAC ($2,750) the entire system was as high end as the rest of the tower, even though much of the gear managed to stay well under the $5k barrier. Its a perfect example of what can be done for that large market of individuals deep into the hobby, but still can’t budget car-sized price tags towards it.
As for the LTA UltraLinear ($6,800), expect autobiasing for the tubes, selected NOS glass and switchable Mono/Stereo options. Interested parties can check out more of the spec’s and tech here.
We got a chance to sit down with LTA founder Mark Schneider at the show to get his take on David Berning’s output transformerless ZOTL designs and the insight was quite enlightening. Founded in 2015, the company has continued to bring ZOTL options to market alongside David, pulling the thread even further out from original MicroZOTL. David’s original designs are still used for the inspiration of amplification, with Mark’s engineering taking over the rest of the internals. Keep an eye out for that interview in season 4 of PTA’s The Occasional Podcast.
