Choice Audio, Inc

Amazing service and knowledge of audio/video. He always try’s to find the right piece of gear for your system and budget. He is the only best I trust to give AV advice and not oversell me.

I recently purchased a Parasound Pre 200 Preamplifier Dac through Choice Audio, and in the past I have also purchased a JL Audio subwoofer. As I have frequently told friends and my girlfriend the goal of obtaining the best reproduction of music I can afford is not a hobby but a passion.

With both pieces of gear I purchased through Choice Audio James was very knowledgeable and able to give excellent insight. In the case of the subwoofer I learned important set up info that greatly increased my enjoyment of it in my system. You can spend a great deal of time and money and have highly regarded components but if they aren't properly matched with each other and set up they will at the very least never reveal the potential they are capable of.

I am also very happy with the Parasound Preamp Dac. I can't resist listening right out of the box when I get something new but try not to be to critical until it has a break in period.

The Parasound sounded impressive right away and got more so very fast. This wasn't just the unit warming up because I can fire it up cold now and it's all there.

Tighter rounder bass wasn't something I was expecting to be noticeable but it's very definitely making a positive impact top to bottom. You know you are on to something when you keep listening much longer than usual and thinking up more music you have to try with a new piece of gear. This is a very transparent and analog sounding DAC using both computers through the coax and the USB. Haven't tried the optical yet but the Parasound is supposed to scrub the digital clock to attenuate jitter on all inputs not just the USB unlike lot of DACs.

I also think I prefer the Burr-Brown DACs to the Sabre DAC used in the Oppo gear. I have used some gear with Sabre DACs and thought it sounded very transparent and good but this Parasound has the transparency and that tube like glow within quality also.

Having the ability to switch on or off and control the trim of the sub in real time from the remote is really nice for sure. There are also tone controls for bass and treble on the remote that I didn't think I would use but they actually do enhance some of what I've been listening to. There is at least some of this new music that is so pumped up and overcooked but still good music. I've tried a few methods to make it more listenable and found the Parasounds ability to do these adjustments on the remote very helpful. When you look at the files for some of this overcooked new music with a WAV file editor it's just ridiculous, there are no dynamics at all everything is just loud.

I have never had a stereo preamplifier with home theater by-pass and the Parasound configuration works really nice. Since the front right and left speaker and the sub or subs outputs come right out of the Parasound as they do when you aren't using the by-pass it can't have any detrimental effect on those outputs at all when listening to stereo from the Parasound. It even seems totally transparent regarding the front right and left and sub outputs when using a surround sound processor as your source and of course when using the processor since it's a direct path through you don't have to have the Parasound even turned on. Very happy about all that too.

James has access to some of what I consider to be my favorite lines of gear. You could easily put together everything from what in the realm of high end audio would be a budget bang for the buck system that sounds excellent, to something very close to state of the art.

I definitely can give my highest recommendation to Choice Audio.

"If you are looking for speakers and electronics to make your music and movies sounds their best then you owe it to yourself to talk to the guys at Choice Audio. I first contacted them last fall looking for a REL T5 subwoofer after "The Absolute Sound" rated it a best buy in it's price range. I went there and we listened to a variety of different music with the T5 hooked up to a few different speakers. REL is really in a class by itself when it comes to subs, most musical I have ever heard, they blend seamlessly into the rest of your speakers so you never feel like you are listening to a sub, but rather you end up hearing the rest of speakers producing a quality of sound you never thought them capable of. They make everything in your sound system sound better, in accuracy, transparency and soundstage. They happened to have a T5 thay they had taken in on trade and sold it to me at a very good price. Then a month or two later they said they had heard some speakers from a company out of Italy called Opera. So I went back to their showroom to hear the Mezza bookshelf speakers and the sound was jaw dropping to say the least, the attack speed, soundstage and accuracy of the speakers was amazing. I had been to a number of other dealers and auditioned various speakers from Bowers and Wilkins, bookshelfs,towers and center channels, and also the Magnepan .7's. They make some very nice speakers with a good sound in their own way, even bought a Bowers and Wilkins CM center channel. Nothing I listened to matched the sound of the Mezzas however and when I found out Opera makes a center channel so I sold my Bowers and Wilkins center channel and ordered the Opera Centrale center channel speaker. Turned out to be another great choice as much like the T5 it not only sounds great it makes everything else in my system sound better, not only that but they are the perfect match(REL and Opera), making each other shine. I have a pair of Mezzas on order and can't wait to get those as well.

I really loved the T5 but wanted something to add some more punch my home theatre sound so started looking at the REL S2 and all the reviews I read of it were glowing so decided to order it and turned out to be a great purchase (they even took my T5 back in trade). Even though it has a 10" driver and a bottom facing 10" passive driver it actually has an even faster attack speed and of course more punch than the T5. There aren't enough superlatives to describe it's sound, improves every aspect of sound for music and home theater, revealing every nuance of music and sound, including timbre and realism. I highly recommend calling Choice Audio to audition their REL and Opera products, as well as their primo selection of electronics from companies like Parasound, Unison(sister company of Opera) and Plinius."
So this past Sunday I got the Mezza bookshelf speakers I had ordered from them and after listening to them all week have to say yet again that they sound incredible, so musical you forget you are listening to speakers because all you hear is the music. The combination of the Centrale center channel, the REL S2 sub and the Mezzas in surround produces an incredible wall of sound when listening in surround mode!