Rega Aethos Integrated Amplifier Black

The Rega design team has designed a completely new housing for the new Rega stereo integrated amplifier Aethos. With its 16 A output transistors, the Aethos delivers a stable output power of 156 watts per channel at 6 ohms. The Aethos is built completely discretely in double mono technology, with the preamp working in pure Class A operation.

A specially developed toroidal transformer ensures a stable power supply.
The uncompromising construction of the Aethos with selected, high-quality components allows playback of the highest sound quality. This guarantees years of trouble-free operation and musical enjoyment.

Innovative design

A great deal of time and money was invested in the development of the Aethos and the most suitable components were compared. This resulted in practical detailed solutions such as the switchable direct input and a preamplifier output for flexible use in different systems. The picture is completed by a headphone output, when used, the speakers are muted without additional interfering contacts.

With the Aethos, Rega has taken the successful concept of the integrated amplifier, Elex-R and Elicit-R to a whole new level. Features such as stages built up discretely with FET transistors, polypropylene capacitors in the signal path, special charging capacitors, regulated power supply and a current-stable output stage with 2 x 4 high-performance transistors specially developed by Sanken for the Aethos.

Input level and volume control

A further developed, high-precision volume control with active and passive mode of action, which was originally developed for the Elex-R, works in the line input stage of the Aethos. This new, optimized volume control using Alps potentiometers has been perfected through the use of discrete operational amplifiers with FET input.

In this circuit, the input level and negative feedback value are varied simultaneously in order to set the volume precisely. Channel tracking here depends more on the precision of the amplifier parts than on the potentiometer itself. This is a suitable measure to limit channel deviations to a minimum and at the same time to optimize noise and headroom.

Such sophisticated circuits are otherwise only found in devices used in professional recording studio technology.
The technical and tonal advantages of low-impedance drivers are well known. However, with conventional transistors they have quite high quiescent currents. However, the low-impedance driver stage combined with the newly developed 160 watt Darlingtons with integrated base network allows the construction of a complementary emitter follower with good thermal stability and reduced driver current. When designing the circuit for the new Aethos, two output stages with drivers and basic network run in parallel. (With conventional circuit concepts, only the output transistors are connected in parallel).
In this way, the output power of 2 x 125 watts at 8 ohms is easily achieved.

Technical specifications:

Output power:
125 watts/8 ohms both channels driven
156 watts/6 ohms both channels driven
Headphone output: 2.7V -12.5V depending on the load / 110 ohms
Tape output: 220mV / 560 ohms
Line output: 840mV / 100 ohms
Input sensitivity Line input 1….5 and Rec. 220 mV / 17kOhm
Maximum input level : 11.5 V (full scale of the rec-out)
Input sensitivity Direct Input: 840mV / 50kOhm
Amplification amplifier: 32 dB
Frequency response at 100W at 8 ohms: line input 10Hz/-(0.8dB)….30kHz(-0.5dB)
Direct Input 10Hz/-(0.8dB)….50kHz(-0.5dB)
Distortion and noise 100W/8Ohm: 20Hz-30kHz typical 0.007%
Power consumption from the at full load: 415 watts at 156W/6 ohms
Mains fuse : 3.15AT
Dimensions H x W x D: 112 x 434 x 350 mm
Weight : 17.5 kg
remote control, instructions