The Paraphase is a tube preamp that you could say has it roots traced back to Jadis. And that’s because the owner and designer of Audio Matiere used to be a designer at Jadis. But that’s where the commonality ends. Bang for the buck, we would put our money on Audio Matiere. They are fantastically well designed audio gears and in this this case, the Paraphase preamp, its a beautiful design that sounds so musical, its $6,000 MSRP was a bargain. The preamp is a fairly wide unit at 21″ (so if you intend to put this in a rack, make sure it is wide enough) and measures 15″ deep and 6″ tall. It uses two EZ81/6CA4, two EL84 and two ECC88 tubes. Built and finish is really great with very solid materials used. We had this playing side by side with the Jadis JP-80MC preamp and the difference between them is so marginal its a no-brainer which want we would choose if we were on a tight budget. The Jadis does sound a bit smoother, a bit more composed whereas the Paraphase was the young upshot. It displayed similar smoothness but with a bit more dynamism and up tempo. Design and layout inside shared a common theme with the Jadis where simplicity is the law of the land, so no remote control feature. The Paraphase is a line only preamp with the phono input and optional add on. So in this case, the phono input on the unit acts as an AUX input (marked as such on the unit). One of the quirks of this preamp is the acrylic top cover is secured down by placing screws in the holes around it. The metal case that the cover sits on have hole openings but are not threaded so the screws do not screw on. It is just to hold it there. I guess this is to facilitate easier tube rolling?
Cosmetically, the preamp is in great shape. Very minor scuff marks here and there from use but nothing major. Unit will be securely packed for safe shipping.
