Rotel is appropriately milking its 60th anniversary year, today following up on the launch of the A12, CD14 and RCD-1572 MKII components with the announcement of an all-new and, can we say, fittingly named Diamond Series.
The two-strong Diamond Series comprises the DT-6000 DAC transport and RA-6000 integrated amplifier and introduces a design language that brings a welcome contemporary flair to the brand's familiarly traditional casework. The range sits just below Rotel's high-end Michi brand offering and yet benefits from "Michi-inspired" circuit design.
Going directly to the source, as any journalist is trained to do, we start at the DT-6000, which is centered around an eight-channel ESS Sabre ES9028PRO DAC. The DAC is configured to dedicate four mono converter chips each to the left and right channels and also feeds fully balanced output filters.
Power comes courtesy of an in-house manufactured and, as you'd expect, shielded, toroidal transformer that features "high-efficiency" slit foil smoothing capacitors for reducing stray emissions and delivering isolated, low-noise power to all critical circuits.
A tray-loading mechanism accommodates those shiny silver discs of yours, and other digital sources can be connected via a trio of digital inputs. The coaxial and optical sockets accept PCM files up to 32-bit/384kHz, while the PC-USB input also handles MQA and DSD audio playback.
Its partner in crime, the RA-6000 integrated, also boasts an impressive connectivity list spanning – deep breath – coaxial, optical, RCA and XLR analogue, MQA-supporting PC-USB, aptX HD Bluetooth, an iOS USB for Apple devices, and, last but not least in this vinyl-crazy world, a moving magnet phono stage.
The RA-600 delivers 350 watts of power into 4ohm speaker loads and benefits from, Rotel says, technical and performance designs from Michi models that specifically concern circuit design, acoustic component selection and power supply engineering methods. The amplifier also further develops the upgrades found in the aforementioned MKII models that arrived earlier this year.
Available in black and silver, the Rotel Diamond Series will be available from next month, with the DT-6000 transport priced at £1999 / AU$3199 (approx $2300) and the RA-6000 integrated costing £3999 / AU$6399 (approx $4600).
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