Atoll of France makes my favorite affordable integrated amps and separates. They make them in France, not China, with a three year warranty!
This entry is to highlight two class shattering components, the Atoll PR200 preamp and AM200 power amp. I’ll also bring in a matching CD player with accessible DAC to round out the system package. These components are built to a higher standard IN FRANCE, and yet are similar in price to the gear made in Chinese job houses. As we show comparisons in build quality, keep in mind almost everything the competitors offer is built in China.
PR200 Preamp $1500
Atoll’s PR200 is a super star preamp! It is priced in line stage configuration. You can add a DAC board ($300) or Phono ($130 MM) board if you like. We have them in stock and can install them here at the shop. This MO allows you to build your own pizza. If you don’t need a DAC or Phono board, why pay for them? If you do, you’ll get outstanding performance at a low price because the infrastructure of PR200 is fearsomely substantial. If you buy a DAC or Phono preamp as stand alone units, you’ll be paying for the chassis, buttons, connections and power supply all over again. It’s actually a very good value to get these boards in the PR200 because its infrastructure is so hearty. It will run $700 to get a marginally superior phono preamp. It will run $1000 to get a slightly superior DAC. In both instances, such improvements are minor and not really worth the extra heavy cost.
What really makes PR200 special is its SOUND. Its flavor is warm and full. It has excellent definition with no grainy character or BITE. Virtually everything else in this price range comes from China and sounds thinner and less dynamic. Why?
You can absolutely tie the sound of a product to what’s inside. Let’s analyze PR200.
The chassis is made of steel and has a brushed aluminum face plate of just under 1/4”. This solid structure dwarfs what the Chinese mass produce and provides a solid substrate on which to build outstanding products that last decades.
Atoll’s circuit boards are a work of art. They’re made in their factory in France, not purchased from China and ASSEMBLED in France. More than a few competitors do this and claim that they’re not built in China. Hmmm. There’s sleight of hand going on there. The boards feature nickel/gold for optimal signal transfer. The parts on the board are though hole instead of surface mount. Through hole parts sound better, accommodate heat better, and are more more easily serviced for many years compared to surface mounts.
The Atoll PCBs are laid out with computer design so there is virtually no running wire on them. This maximizes efficiency of signal transfer and negates RFI. When you see products with spaghetti running all over the place, such wiring acts as antennae- promulgating RFI. While some companies brag that point to point wiring is superior, that is NOT the case. Point to point wiring invites hum and noise, fomented by dental floss sized wiring running under the hood.
PR200’s heart is a large, 340VA, low loss TOROIDAL transformer that Atoll has custom built for them in Spain. Atoll uses 32,000 uF filter capacitance to provide a beefy power supply. The power supply of PR200 is more substantial than most $2000 POWER AMPS.
The combination of the huge transformer and big filter caps is vital to creating Atoll’s rich sound. You simply cannot garner the warmth of Atoll with small, flimsy parts installed in a rickety tin case.
PR200 uses a precise tracking ALPS volume control (motorized potentiometer). It tracks accurately and FEELS heavy and solid. It’s a joy to use. When you turn the Atoll volume control you can feel a direct relationship to the power the system will deliver. I’ve seen many a high end preamp with a sissy-fied volume control that waters down the experience.
Inputs include Aux, CD, Tuner, DVD and a full tape loop! There is also a bypass link but I hate running HT bypass. Don’t do it.
There are two fully buffered preamp outputs! This is key because you can run one power amp, or two, or most likely, one power amp and a powered sub. Many affordable preamps only give you one set of pre outs, so you have to use Y cables which often invites hum. Or, even worse, they give you a single sub output with a fixed crossover point. This puts your subwoofer behind the 8 ball because you’ve quashed the flexibility of the sub’s Xover behavior. It can no longer dovetail with your right and left wing speakers because it starts one stair below where it should.
The power cord is detachable in case you want to move up stream from the stock cable.
Atoll provides an Atoll System Remote Control. Assuming you have good enough taste to get an Atoll CD player too, you’re system set.
AM200 Power Amp $2200 (120×2)
The heart, or power supply of your power amp is even more important than the preamp. Yet let’s be clear, a muscular supply pays large benefits in both components (& the matching CD player by the way).
As you evaluate an Atoll power amp, look to what’s inside of it, not the wattage rating. Wattage ratings are derived from amplifier performance into test resistors. All things being equal, they can be meaningful. But rarely are all things equal when it comes to Atoll vs the “other guys.” Due to bigger transformers, caps and other details I’ll describe below, Atoll amp performance goes way beyond what test resistors can tell us.
You’ll find the AM200 will sound fuller in weight, and warmth, than 300×2 competitors that aren’t as stout internally. Atoll runs LINEAR power supplies which deliver a heavier/smoother sound, than SWITCHING (SMPS) supplies which sound thin. The difference in the guts of the products is important, not the spec sheet. Atoll amps are class AB, running into conspicuously high levels of A behavior before switching.
AM200 is built similarly to PR200 when it comes to chassis and mechanics. My comments about PCBs and layout are the same with AM200. AM200 goes a step further because it’s a power amp. It uses Mundorf caps that are housed in their own mu-metal boxes on the PCB to eliminate
potential RFI intrusion. It’s quite rare at any price point for a manufacturer to recognize this importance and go to the trouble to build proactively as Atoll does.
The heart of AM200 begins with TWO of the muscular Spain built 340VA Toroidal transformers. Filter capacitance is just under 60,000 uF. Atoll has designed its own caps which are custom manufactured for them in Japan. AM200 has the physiology of a middle linebacker! We’ll do some comparisons below that will help you appreciate how unique Atoll’s construction is.
Atoll runs MATCHED MOSFET Output transistors. MATCHING is important to achieve smooth, vs grainy sound.
No two output transistors have an identical behavior pattern. Imagine that you have hand drawn a circle. That’s the performance of one transistor. Now draw a second. No matter how good you are, it’s difficult to draw the second one even close to the first, much less identical. The differences between the two (since they play in tandem) when playing music result in distortion. The more transistors you have, the more distortion there is.
Atoll takes the trouble to HAND MATCH TRANSISTORS. Atoll tests every transistor that comes in house. Each is measured and graphed. Transistors are then grouped and installed with stable mates. It is impossible to be IDENTICAL, so we’re shooting for as close as possible in the real world. Here is where Atoll’s efforts pay off vs companies who buy thousands of transistors and just plug them in as they come out of the box. The variance among transistors creates a grainy harshness to the sound. Non matched transistors would be like running tuning forks simultaneously- that are supposed be tuned the same, but play at different frequencies. The resulting differences create a smearing effect.
Atoll uses MOSFET transistors vs bipolars. MOSFETS are more efficient, run faster and have superior current flow. MOSFETS run cooler and their higher speed delivers superior definition.
CD80 Compact Disc Player $1750
By now you’ll probably infer than I’m going to say the same things about Atoll CD players as the other electronics above. You’re right.
Most of our customers have run cheap, lightweight Chinese CD players into nice systems over the years. How were you to know that everything we’ve been discussing above in preamps and amps, also carries over to CD players as well?
If you run a $500 Chinese CD player into a great preamp and amp like Atoll, you’ve created an out of sync bar graph. The same would be true if you ran a cheapy plastic turntable into an otherwise strong system.
If your CD player is a three, and your preamp and amp are tens, guess what the limiting factor is in your performance? Yup, we need to run a TEN CD player in front of the terrific preamp and amp to let them show their stuff. CD80 is a ten.
CD80 is built on the same metal chassis as other Atoll components. The mechanical structure of the CD player is vital to giving it a fighting chance. High resonance is a spoiler to CD performance. CD80 runs EIGHT (8!) regulated power supplies! CD80 runs a pair of transformers to isolate tasks. Filter capacitance is 13,000 uF which is what you’d find in a 60×2 power amp. Beefy transformers and filter caps pay off in CD performance as they do preamp and amp performance.
Atoll likes Burr Brown DACs for its CD players. BB DACs are run without negative feedback which assures that your musical timbre will be more smooth and rich, than thin or edgy. Many competitors run latest greatest DAC chips with oodles of processing and require negative feedback to control their behavior. They’ll have you think that latest and more processing is better, when in fact, this implementation delivers more harsh, thin sound. Imagine a TV picture that is more crystalline in definition, but less warm and natural in color. Atoll goes for the more warm/musical presentation, rather than a more dry/stark performance. What looks good on the spec sheet doesn’t always translate to better musical character.
CD80 has a surprise up its sleeve. You can access the BB DAC with other sources, most likely a streamer. CD80 has inputs of OPT, Coax and USB-B. If you’re running a nice streamer like a Bluesound, you can improve its sound by running digital OUT into one of the CD80’s DAC INPUTS.
Now you’ll be listening to the TLC of Atoll’s DAC and line stage resolution, vs what’s endemic to a highly processing chipset.
CD80 comes with an Atoll system remote, as does PR200. The single remote will run this marvelous stack I’ve recommended.
The Stack
We’ve created a GREAT $5450 STACK of Atoll here! We have this exact stack configured in our shop. I’m happy to tell you this stack is the point of diminishing returns for the vast majority of our shoppers. This means… to PERCEIVE any improvement in performance will require a big financial upgrade. Further, that upgrade will be subtle- compared to investing that same amount of money in speakers.
No two speakers sound the same. You can find many at the same price point that sound dramatically different from one another. The difference among electronics isn’t as vast. Most people are wiser to find the point of diminishing returns in electronics and then focus bigger dollars on the speakers.
You can’t go wrong by using this great Atoll Stack as the foundation for your upgraded music system!