Hegel H-190 Integrated Amp $4350
150×2, Damping Factor of 4000!
We all know the Middle Child sometimes gets lost in the shuffle. It ain’t fair. Well, maybe it is in YOUR family, but not in the Hegel family!
H590 ($12k, 301×2) is the big brother. He gets industry wide accolades and deserves them.
H390 ($6500, 250×2) is next in line and gets credit for being almost as good as 590, at half the $.
This brings us to the Middle Child, the rock solid H190. H190 isn’t the biggest or the loudest. But it very likely is plenty for your application. And it delivers the whole suite of Hegel benefits. Let’s start with the all important amp section.
Amp Section
H190 is conservatively rated at 150×2 into 8 ohms. Its damping factor is the same as its bigger brothers, 4000. This means H190 will control your drivers very well- especially the most demanding elements, your woofers. They won’t go flopping in the breeze. If you appreciate hearing the skins of a great drum kit or the fingers on a stand up bass fiddle with lots of character, you’re thinking in line with Hegel.
You might equivocate Hegel amp control to torque in towing. Some cars can drive at 100MPH but don’t have the ability to pull a donkey cart. Other vehicles can tow your boat and still keep up good speed on the highway. If you want kick drums to sound like they’re in your living room, please consider Hegel.
H190 starts as an AB amp on paper. But it goes well beyond that. Due to Hegel’s patented SoundEngine 2 circuitry, there is unique transistor operation that is effectively “class A all the way.”
You get rid of the distortion of a pile of transistors due to SoundEngine 2.
Owner Bent Hotler explains this succinctly in a video that’s just over two minutes that we’ve posted at the top of our Latest section. Please take a couple minutes to let Bent explain it to you. He’s a brilliant guy- a new breed of engineer who doesn’t settle for standard operating procedures. SoundEngine 2 is patented and is the first and most important step in differentiating Hegel from the other guys.
Discrete Preamp
Hegel painstakingly matches transistors in its preamp boards. Instead of using op amps where typically hundreds of parts are on a chip, Hegel goes to the trouble to measure/match and install discrete transistors in its circuit boards. The sonic advantage of going to this effort is that you derive greater transparency and tactile character from your music. With many preamps or integrateds, you not only lose character or nuance with chips, but you can actually hear the input overload because it doesn’t have the capacity to deal with the incoming signal.
SynchroDAC
Hegel treats the DAC section of its integrated differently from everyone else. Hegel prefers a synchronous DAC that doesn’t upsample and filter signals. Hegel chooses to read the signal in its native form and not try to bugger with it to make it “better.”
Let me offer this video analogy for you. Back in the day we had video with lines that were evident in the picture. Some people would install line doublers to soften the obvious lines. The problem is that in doing so, the picture itself was softened or blurred. Was the solution worse than the problem? Often so!
When listening through Hegel’s SynchroDAC, there is NO DOUBT the definition and dynamics are improved compared to listening to the DAC of almost anything else running into it. You hear increased clarity and life with SynchroDAC.
Iconoclast
I’m a bit of an iconoclast at heart. I really like the fact that Hegel doesn’t just do the same thing as everyone else. Sometimes it pays to chart your own path and NOT do what everyone else does. That’s what Bent Holter is doing with Hegel.
The amp section is more dynamic and transparent with SoundEngine 2.
The preamp section has superior resolution and headroom due to the use of discrete components and labor intensive parts matching in Oslo.
The DAC section is better due to its synchronous operation.
These are all choices Bent Holter makes, that run astray of what most companies are doing. They pay off handsomely in all Hegels, but in this case of great bang for the buck, H190.
The Little Brothers
H95 runs $2200 (60×2)
H120 runs $3200 (75×2)
I love ‘em both at their price points. Damping factor is 2000, which is very strong. Please don’t miss that the Middle Child has double the control.
H-190 can handle some real brutes with authority, like Maggies and the Bryston A and T series. When people hear these speakers with Hegel integrateds, they’re shocked and awed! It’s true the speakers are capable of impressive performance. But it takes special electronics to get the most out of them. The Middle Child gets you most of the way there. Always sensible and yet overlooked in the grand scheme of things… don’t forget the Middle Child!
