Classe Touts High-End Components For Hot Racks
By Joseph Palenchar -- TWICE, 9/21/2009
Atlanta— Classé Audio, the subsidiary of Bowers & Wilkins, arrived at the CEDIA Expo with its new Custom Theater (CT) series of four amplifiers and a new surround-sound preamp/processor.
All are promoted as the only true high-end audio components suitable for installation in equipment racks or custom cabinetry because they hold up in hot, noisy environments that degrade performance and reliability, said David Nauber, brand development executive VP. They ship in September.
The four new CT amplifiers consist of the mono 600-watt CT-M600 at $6,500 and mono 300-watt CT-M300 at $5,000, a 300-watt $6,500 CT-2300 stereo model, and a $9,000 5x300-watt CT-5300, all featuring class AB design, adjustable rack rails, a detachable faceplate and a new cooling system called ICTunnel for Intelligent Cooling Tunnel. It consists of a sensor-controlled aluminum bonded-fin heat sink cooled by a noiseless fan. Fins providing almost 31 square feet of surface area are hidden inside, Nauber said.
The $9,000 CT-SSP surround-sound preamp/processor uses the same circuitry as the company’s SSP-800 with identical features and performance and price, but the new model’s appearance and chassis design are designed for use in professional equipment racks. The 10-channel processor decodes Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio.
