McIntosh Tube-Type MA2275 Integrated Amplifier in Super Shape w/Low Reserve

If you find yourself in the New York metropolitan area, drop by our store. We’re CSA Audio Design and we’re located in Montclair NJ, just about 20 miles from Manhattan. We recently moved to a new, larger location across the street and have expanded our product portfolio. We have many of the best brands in the business on display, and a top-flight installation department. Here we have the perfect integrated amplifier for your dream McIntosh system. We have carried McIntosh for a number of years, but we will not be carrying the line anymore, so we have this unit up for sale. What we have here is a McIntosh MA2275 tube-type integrated amplifier for sale. It was a demo unit in the store and has been used VERY little. I would be shocked if it even has played 50 hours of music! The first thing I did was to dust it off and take photos of it. The unit is about six years old (as I said with VERY little use). It had a little dust on the chrome. After a smidge of dusting it looks fantastic. The folks at McIntosh offered to give it a complete check-over for us. So we sent it off to McIntosh for a complete going-through. We actually drove it up to their factory in Binghamton, NY. They checked out all the performance parameters, replaced anything needed to get the amp to perform ideally, and we had them re-box just like a new one it for shipping. Inside the box is the amp, a power cord, the manual, and the tube cage with the tubes removed and placed in special foam blocks for safe travel. It will also come with its preamp-output and main-amp-input jumpers installed. We have not opened the box since we just picked it up from the factory, this week. It will remain as the left it…ready to ship. All we will do is to put more tape around the box. The amp is also bolted to a wooden plate, just like a brand-new one comes. Thanks, McIntosh! We know this is an expensive purchase and we wanted to make sure it would be in super shape for shipping and for you to get many years of pleasure out of. The MA2275 is a combination of, basically, the legendary MC275 power amplifier and a simplified version of the current-model C220 tube preamp on one chassis with three BIG differences… There is enough extra space on the rear of this model for McIntosh to include their super-nice HUGE speaker terminals from their best amp models. These terminals accept bare wire, spades, or banana plugs, and they even allow you to tighten the diameter of the banana jack for a snug fit. The second BIG difference from the MC275 is that you get McIntosh’s great Dynamic Peak Locking meters. These meters take into account the ballistics of the meter’s needle, and the signal (to the meters…not the speakers) gets put into a time stretching circuit so the needle will read peaks accurately. These meters can respond with 90% accuracy to musical peaks that are so brief that the human ear cannot even hear them! Thirdly, you get a connection for 2-Ohm speakers, which the MC275 does not have. One the rear panel, are a set of preamplifier outputs and power amplifier inputs so you can always use it with a bigger power amp. It allows complete separation. I even know of a few people who bought this integrated amp to use ONLY as a power amp, since they wanted an MC275, but they also wanted the meters! What made the MC275 so good; good enough to still be considered one of the world’s best amps after more than 40 years? The major reason it the UNITY COUPLING OUTPUT CIRCUIT. I’ll explain. Tubes like being hooked up to 4,000-Ohm speakers, but nobody has 4,000-Ohm speakers. Speakers range from 2-16 Ohms. In order to deliver full power into real speakers, tube amps have a matching device inside. That’s the OUTPUT TRANSFORMER. It allows you to hook up your 4 or 8-Ohm speakers and the amp THINKS your speakers are 4,000-Ohms and delivers all the power you paid for. So far so good. The problem is that inside the transformer are two coils. One has MANY, MANY, MANY turns (the 4,000-Ohm side) and another with FEW turns (the 4-Ohm side). The necessity to have so many turns and stay reasonably compact means that the wire is usually thin. Thin wires have resistance. Even worse, thin wires in a coil shape have INDUCTANCE that acts like a filter for high frequencies. That’s why most tube amps are only specified for their power and distortion up to, at best, 15,000Hz. So the highest frequencies are being “choked” out before they exit the transformer. McIntosh’s circuit is different. It uses two parallel coils in a differential circuit with a much lower output impedance that likes to see 1,000-Ohms. With this patented circuit, the matching is now 1,000-to-8, not 4,000-to-8. So they do not need as many turns of the coil on the one side of the transformer. This means the wire can be heavier. And the inductance is lower. The result is bandwidth to 50,000Hz and no significant change in distortion across the entire 20-20,000Hz hearing range. Amazing…and this circuit was invented around 1950! The MA2275 is designed to deliver a MINIMUM of 75 Watts per channel. That power is delivered with under .5% distortion across the entire 20-20,000Hz spectrum. Even better, this model has outputs for 8-Ohms, 4-Ohms, and 2-Ohms, which makes it PERFECT for driving low-impedance speakers that would drive virtually all other tube amps crazy. 12AX7A tunes are used in the PHONO PREAMP and HIGH LEVEL PREAMP sections. 12AT7 tubes are used in the early stages of the power amp, and KT88 tubes are used in the output. The tubes have had very little use and are all original McIntosh quality-tested tubes. The preamp stage is tube-type, and it has extremely low noise. In fact, through the high-level inputs, the MA2275 has a signal-to-noise ratio of 97dB, which, remember, includes both the preamp AND power amp. This is utterly amazing for a tube amp…or any amp! The preamp section is capable of delivering up to 8 Volts of clean signal, so it can easily drive both the internal amp and any external amp…or several if you wanted! The input selector knob on the front panel feels like a regular selector switch, but it’s actually a FAKE. When you rotate the knob, it tells a microprocessor which input you want, and then the micro tells tiny switching nodes located adjacent to he appropriate input/output jack to turn on or off. These switching nodes are encapsulated in glass and filled with an inert gas. Then there is metal around the glass to shield it, and then plastic to protect it from shock. What does all this mean to you? It means lower noise, greater reliability, never needing to have the input selector switch cleaned, and almost total elimination of hum. A small light on the front panel alerts you when the amp is warming up. No sound is heard until the warm-up is complete, so you won’t hear pops, click, or other noises through your speakers. The MA2275 has a SECOND SET of PREAMP OUTPUTS in case you want to add another power amp for the same pair of speakers, another amp to power another pair of speakers in another room, or to connect a powered subwoofer. There are two CD inputs, and one is a BALANCED (XLR jack) connection. A GREAT MM PHONO section is included, along with TWO CD inputs, and three more high-level inputs labeled DVD, Tuner, and Tape. You can actually plug almost anything into anything, other than PHONO. McIntosh’s famous natural-sounding BASS and TREBLE controls are included, as well as a BYPASS switch for those who do not use tone controls. The meters can be turned off if you find them distracting (Aren’t you buying this amp for a combination of its sound AND the cool meters?) and can also be set to hold peaks so you can more easily get a reading of your maximum power. The MA2275 comes with a system remote control. If you have any recent model McIntosh CD, DVD, Tuner, or Music Server, you just patch a data cable from it to the MA2275 and the remote that comes with this unit will control those components. There is also a sensor jack on the rear panel. If you need to place this amp away from your listening position, you can purchase a remote sensor to put in the room with your speakers to aim your remote at to operate the amp/system. Things to know… This amplifier was on display in our showroom, but we are selling it as USED per McIntosh policy. PLEASE NOTE: McIntosh has a rule: If it’s sold on the WEB, it MUST be considered USED with no factory warranty. For this reason, even though it is a demo, this item is being sold as USED with no warranty. The MA2275 is about 17 ¾ wide x 10 ¼ high (including the tall feet that allow for proper cooling) x 18 ¾ deep including the knobs. Out of the shipping carton(s) it weighs just under 80 pounds. Although this MA2275 has been in the store for several years, I would be shocked if it has even 50 Hours of total use on it. Most of its life it has sat on a shelf next to other McIntosh amps, and NOT powered up. This model also has LED fiber-optic lighting, so you never need to worry about how many hours are on the front-panel light bulbs…there are none! ELECTRICAL CONDITION: Everything has been checked by McIntosh. VISUAL CONDITION: I can find no visual defects to report of any significance. The glass looks super, the chassis shines, and the whole unit looks great. We had lost the remote, somehow, so it will come with a brand new remote fresh from the factory. The preamp-amp jumpers are now installed on the back of the unit. Shipping will not be cheap, since the amp is about 112 pounds packed up, but who cares when you are saving this much? It can go by UPS. PRICING: We are setting the RESERVE low at $2988.00. THINGS TO KNOW: We accept credit cards for sales to the US or Canada. We do NOT accept Paypal. We will ONLY ship to the US or Canada. If you do not live in the US or Canada, DO NOT BID. TO REPEAT, WE DO NOT SHIP ANYWHERE OTHER THAN THE US OR CANADA. PLEASE DO NOT ASK US TO SHIP ANYWHERE ELSE. Due to McIntosh policies, this item is considered USED with no warranty, refunds, or exchanges. Sales tax will be charged for units sold to / shipped to within New Jersey, and we MUST charge sales tax if it is picked up at the store. The above words are the property of KZ Consulting and are NOT to be copied.