• Returning home from this dazzling performance, I took a listen to Benoit’s superb 2003 recording, Sea Saint Sessions [Telarc] to see what my reference audio system could accomplish in recreating a slice of the magic heard at The Narrows. This is where audio products hand crafted by today’s best audio engineers and designers, like Emmanuel Go of First Sound (“Emmanuel”), can make a huge difference in getting as close as possible to the illusion of reproducing a live concert at home. Emmanuel designs and produces only preamplifiers. The goal of the best preamplifiers is to take the signal from a source component (like a turntable or CD player or DAC) and carry it as undistorted as possible to the amplifier to drive loudspeakers. Read Full Review –Nelson Brill, Boston Concert Reviews

  • First Sound Presence Deluxe MkIII ticks off every box a music-loving audiophile would wish by being ultra resolving, supremely musical, affordable for the high end and with a build quality and appearance which encourage pride of ownership. Emmanuel Go seems to have left no stone unturned when it came to getting the very best performance from this device where every single component, joint and interface undergoes the utmost in scrutiny before being allowed to grace the chassis.
    Even the torque of the nuts and screws underwent experiments. It’s hard for me to envisage how this level of performance could be improved. Yet the Presence Deluxe MkIII has three more levels of upgrades and further up the scale there remain the Paramount and Statement series which culminate in a six-chassis affair which the likes of me wouldn’t even have rack space for. Read Full Review –Christopher Redmond, sixmoons.com Audio Review

  • Listening to any music with the First Sound preamplifier in my system has become a complete mind-body experience.  The sonic capabilities are such that the informational side of my brain and personality are completely sated and I never feel like there is more there in the recording than I hear in my room. But of far more import, the emotional side of me is equally filled as the First Sound pulls off that most tenuous of balancing acts, matching feeling to intellect. In this respect it has few peers in audio and is the reason it has become my personal reference. Read Full Review –Todd Warnke, enjoythemusic.com

  • If it sounds like I am confessing undying love for my “new” First Sound Presence Deluxe Mark II, I really can’t do anything else. I have always loved her—sorry, it—and have said so in reviews of other equipment. I have always felt that she—sorry again, it—added the little things that made a good system better. However, the newly upgraded Presence does more than little things, and is now more than my audio system’s anchor. It is the Yin to my Berning ZH270’s Yang. It—okay then, she—is my music system’s synergistic center. Read Full Review –Gary L. Beard, positive-feedback.com

  • “Utmost clarity, jaw-cracking dynamics, intense and deep bass, and newfound layers of nuance,” but a “complete lack of mechanical sound” too; “of all the sonic skills, detail retrieval was the most astounding”; “the preamp for those who want a passive but need the facilities of an active”. Read Full Review –Todd Warnke, soundstage.com