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Amplification
Hand-wired Texas tube gear with point-to-point honesty and a horn-friendly disposition.
where to hear it
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about raven audio
Raven Audio is Dave Thomson's small East Texas shop, and its identity is bound up with a few stubborn manufacturing choices: every tube amplifier and preamplifier is point-to-point hand-wired, with no printed circuit boards in the signal path, and the company winds many of its own transformers in-house rather than sourcing generic Chinese iron. The house topology runs to simple, low-feedback designs around classic bottles — KT88, KT150, EL34, 6L6, and 300B variants — voiced for tone density and ease rather than measured spec-sheet heroics. That bias toward high-efficiency partners is deliberate: Raven's amps are tuned with horns and 90+ dB sensitivity speakers in mind, and the company's own Corvus Reference monitor and Raptor horn loudspeaker are the in-house statements of what they think the amps should drive. The core electronics line spans the Blackhawk LE Mk.3 integrated — the gateway product, a 20-watt KT-series push-pull that has become Raven's calling card under $4k — up through the Nighthawk Mk.3 integrated, the Shaman line preamps, and the Elite Series Reference monoblocks at the top. The Raven turntable, a belt-drive plinth-and-arm package, rounds out a lineup that lets a buyer source amp, speakers, and front end from one builder. Most sales go direct, factory-warrantied, with a long in-home trial — a model that frees Raven from dealer-margin math but also means you won't audition one at a typical brick-and-mortar. The customers are mainly Klipsch Heritage, Tekton, and DeVore owners chasing a warmer, more lit-up midrange than solid-state delivers, plus 300B romantics who want hand-wired construction without ARC, VAC, or Cary money. Where Audio Research chases bandwidth and precision, VAC chases refinement and parts-cost prestige, and Cary chases a polished commercial finish, Raven is the scrappier, more idiosyncratic option — Texas-built, owner-answered phone, voiced for horns, and priced as if the middleman never existed.