- Stripped to the bare essentials, providing maximum satisfaction solid state amplifiers
- Discrete, reliable through-hole PCB construction
- Great quality parts: Mundorf M-lytics and M-Cap ZNs capacitors, Alps Blue Velvet potentiometer, Omron input relays, Toshiba bipolar transistors
- Short, clean signal path:
- Input select: relay-based triggered with rotary switch on long shaft (Ecstasy III, Menuetto)/ flip switch (Ampino)
- Volume control: Alps potentiometer on long shaft, close to the input selector
- No output relay purist design
- Soft-start system with no turn-on thump
- Handmade in Europe
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John Hoffman, Positive Feedback:
"The location and size of the heat sink is a clever way to provide shielding between the signal path and the power supply of the amplifier, and is one example of the smart engineering that has gone into this product. The output stage uses two pair of Japanese bipolar output transistors, allowing the amplifier to drive speakers with complex crossover networks and low impedance dips."
"There is nothing drastically new inside of this amplifier, as this is a well executed product that does not employ short cuts or a gimmicky circuit in an attempt to stand out in the market. The principals at Dayens are using an old fashioned model of product development. Design an amplifier with solid engineering principles, use good quality parts, and present it to the market without a great deal of hype. Knowledgeable hobbyists can discern for themselves what is an excellent product is, and this pair of mono-blocks is targeted at them."
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"The Dayens Ampino mono-block amplifiers echo this type of philosophy, for the performance of these amplifiers give testimony to the effort and hard work that has gone into refining this circuit. The Dayens amps are a wide bandwidth design with a high signal to noise ratio, and these attributes become very evident with an in-depth listening session. I found the Ampino amplifiers to be well balanced, detailed, refined, and yet never boring or stodgy. These amps have the ability to engage the listener for extended period of time, and perform at a level that is typically reserved for products that sell for significantly more. The fit and finish of the Dayens products are quite nice, although it is easy to tell that only the required amount of money was spent on cosmetics, and no more. So in the end, the consumer gets a product that offers legitimate high performance and sound quality, yet has a reasonable price tag because the manufacturer spent the money allocated for cosmetics wisely. For those hobbyists looking for a high quality mid-powered solid state amplifier, the Dayens Ampino mono-blocks are worth checking into."
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