Billed as a worthy successor to the Pandora, the Helios sits between the Essence preamplifier and the flagship Commander.
Designed to complement the recent Antileon Revelation, though naturally compatible with all power amplifiers on the market, this new Danish preamplifier must be paired with the new dual-mono PSU 5 power supply, also unveiled at the same time.
Designed by Tom Møller, the Helios’s pure Class A topology utilizes brand-new ultra-low-noise dual JFETs. Fully balanced, the circuits draw power from two 65 VA toroidal transformers coupled with large polypropylene capacitors, offering a total capacity of 83,000 µF per channel, with the output signal benefiting from a complete absence of global negative feedback.
Housed in an imposing CNC-machined extruded aluminium chassis, the pre-amp measures 17.3 cm in height and weighs 13.9 kg, whilst the PSU 5 retains the same dimensions but weighs a heavier 18.2 kg. On the front panel of the audio unit, a 4.3-inch (11 cm) TFT touchscreen, positioned behind a 4 mm-thick glass panel, allows you to view and select sources and volume, the latter controlled by a new 85-step relay attenuator.
At the rear, the dual-mono design is evident as all the terminal blocks are completely separated between left and right. In addition to small 12V inputs/outputs and two ports for Green Bias, gold-plated Neutrik XLR balanced ports predominate, with two pairs of outputs and three pairs of inputs. RCA terminals have not been overlooked either, with two pairs of inputs and one output; inputs 3 (XLR) and 4 (RCA) can be configured for fixed volume.
And to make the Helios the core of your system, two extension slots allow you to add the DAC3 module with USB, S/PDIF, AES/EBU and TOSLINK inputs, as well as the PS3 MM/MC phono module, featuring 8 switches to adjust the load. However, this module is based on a single pair of XLR phono inputs, which should be taken into account when choosing your cable or turntable.
We will provide the prices as soon as they are confirmed by the distributor.
