[daveneumann]

[QUOTE=mulveling;1054129]I've gone back & forth between Ref 6 and VAC Master (and Ren V) in my own system. The Ref 6 is a wonderful sounding pre that will give you a little bit of sweetness and tube bloom. Will it be enough tube sweetness? Depends on the rest of your system. The Master is a wonderful pre that will give you more tube sweetness and bloom - a really big helping of it. Will it be too much? Depends on your system. The Ren V sounds very similar to the Master but the latter is clearly more articulate and dynamic. I assume the Signature SE is in between the two. The Master pairs brilliantly well with a SS amp (Phison) or a clean SS-like tube amps (Rogue Apollo Dark). But with the matching VAC 200iQ monos it can actually be "too much of good thing" for tube sweetness - though many will love this pairing, it can be just a bit too much for me, in my system (which also has a VAC phono, Koetsu/Benz cartridges, and Tannoy speakers contributing towards this cumulative "sweetness"). Meanwhile the Ref 6 actually paired beautifully with 200iQ's here.

Thanks for the comparisons and descriptions. This is very helpful. Was your Ref 6 the SE version?

The VAC Master is out of my price range by far, but the Signature SE fits. The rest of my system is on the warm/neutral side, especially the Pass amps and Strads. The Pass XP22 and XP27 seem neutral and the same with my cartridge and TT.