Radford Revival STA15 Reissue

Back in the sixties, Radford made probably some of the best Top End valve amps outside of the US. I have to say this and forgive me for putting a wet blanket over it all, that's not saying much in today's market!!! At least the silly prices you pay for such antiquarian gear will hold. I had an STA25/SC22 from 1966 when it was eleven years old in 1977. It was good, but equalled by a half decent solid state amp. I sold it for a hundred and twenty quid to a Hungarian surgeon on a UK visit in 1979 (no idea how many hundreds that equates to today). Not sure why someone would resurrect a fifty year old amp as originally presented unless it was to cater for the retro market in the far east - at least Naim put their 1950's PA amp in fresh clothes...

Shane, you had a Croft Series V and didn't keep it long enough to bond with it and the considerable musical qualities on offer. That was an amazingly good example of a low wattage valve power amp (a kind of NVA A20 or A30 level from previous decades), well priced without the excessive price, hype and cachet a Radford would have today and limited purely by the preamp feeding it with music.

I've said my piece and shall take my wet blanket with me I'm a hoarder rather than a box swapper - and was never a box-shifter in my time either! I'd have loved a Croft series V in my collection but they hold value rather too well

I don't think so, just rather small and cosy in the vein of a £200 NVA A20 or Naim Nait. Some BBC research done decades ago suggested (if I have it right) that we can accept up to 10db of compression before it becomes seriously audible (the paper are online if anyone wishes to read themselves) and if a 15WPC amp soft clips benignly, as say, an A20 or my Quad II's do, they can sound like a 60W solid state amp before it goes into one.

A Nait mk1 into Isobariks went up to a point and then could go no louder (using CD it was around 'eight thirty' on the volume pointer and 'nine thirty' using vinyl. More than this, the sound gently squashed up as I understand a compressor does. Today, a P20/A20 is similar only with CD the volume is roughly at ten o'clock on the P20 scale. Beyond that, this amp sounds increasingly 'breathless' but never really harsh at all.

Shane, my 'wet blanket' went in the wash and was hung out to dry today along with me on a Harbeth Facebook group when I dared to suggest that these speakers needed shedloads of power to make them come to life by taking a metaphorical carrot out of their port-holes. I don't want to keep resurrecting my hectoring school-master persona, but I can't demonstrate the 'stuff' I come out with and which I feel to be the truth as see it and I'm beginning to realise you lot don't want me to either, so I become a laughing stock 'cos nobody likes a smart arse..

If you can find one of these Radfords (so much less bother than an original which will need shedloads of expensive restoration work by now), then you buy it and have some fun listening to music through it