Grateful Dead Music Forum

Anyone see this?
https://reverb.com/item/85758639-sarno- ... urce=braze

I can't find any discussion on it around here.

First time for me too! Looks like more of an "old school" preamp. A Sarno with true spring reverb!

You have to message him directly on fb or email. They’re not on his site and afaik he builds them as they’re ordered.

I happily sold my SMS CTP shortly after getting the Spectrum. It rules.

Cost?

TI4-1009 wrote: ↑Fri Nov 29, 2024 5:33 pmCost?

You should ask Brad. The SMS Classic is $710 and the Rev is $925 (add $100 for XLR outputs). Would guess it is around a grand or so. It does have spring reverb and a cool faceplate.

The price from October 2023 was $1450 plus shipping from a thread on the steel guitar forum, info directly from Brad.

https://bb.steelguitarforum.com/viewtop ... 1d33f7d1a7

“It's not on the site because it's such a labor intensive build. I have a wait list of a dozen or so people, and I'm happy to add anyone to the wait list, no deposit, no commitment. Turnaround is currently about 8-9 weeks.

Also, they're intro priced at $1450 + shipping”

Wow! Point-to-point hand wired. Old school!

And notice the PCBA appears to be power and ground, hefty traces. Easy to repair components on top, shielded cables in critical signal paths. I’m guessing it sounds as good as it looks.

Received my spectrum last spring. As good as advertised, worth every penny if you can swing it. I played a SMS CTP w/jer mods for a while and liked it but just wished that it had spring reverb. Tried running a surfy bear through it for a while but when I found out Brad was building the spectrum I immediately got on the list for one and haven’t looked back. Sounds incredible.

Tacosauce wrote: ↑Mon Feb 10, 2025 1:16 am Received my spectrum last spring. As good as advertised, worth every penny if you can swing it. I played a SMS CTP w/jer mods for a while and liked it but just wished that it had spring reverb. Tried running a surfy bear through it for a while but when I found out Brad was building the spectrum I immediately got on the list for one and haven’t looked back. Sounds incredible.

What power amp do you use with it?

UncleJesse wrote: ↑Tue Mar 04, 2025 1:58 pm

Tacosauce wrote: ↑Mon Feb 10, 2025 1:16 am Received my spectrum last spring. As good as advertised, worth every penny if you can swing it. I played a SMS CTP w/jer mods for a while and liked it but just wished that it had spring reverb. Tried running a surfy bear through it for a while but when I found out Brad was building the spectrum I immediately got on the list for one and haven’t looked back. Sounds incredible.

What power amp do you use with it?

Not the person you're asking BUT with my Spec, I've been running it through either:

Fryette PS-2A (rack mountable)
MC50
MC100

Have a KRS PA-100R en route. Hopefully that's the ticket in terms of both rackmountability and tone without being too heavy.

UncleJesse wrote: ↑Tue Mar 04, 2025 1:58 pm

Tacosauce wrote: ↑Mon Feb 10, 2025 1:16 am Received my spectrum last spring. As good as advertised, worth every penny if you can swing it. I played a SMS CTP w/jer mods for a while and liked it but just wished that it had spring reverb. Tried running a surfy bear through it for a while but when I found out Brad was building the spectrum I immediately got on the list for one and haven’t looked back. Sounds incredible.

What power amp do you use with it?

Hey Jesse,

Sorry, just saw your question. I use an MC2300 at home (too heavy to lug around) and a MosValve tube works MV-962 for gigs.

Sounds great through both, but sounds GREAT through the McIntosh

And while I’m here and we’re on this topic, I took the top panel off out of curiosity to look inside when it arrived. This amp is a goddamn work of art, I’ve never seen amp guts (if that’s the best term?) so clean and organized.

Brad killed it with this.

Tacosauce wrote: ↑Tue Apr 01, 2025 11:33 am And while I’m here and we’re on this topic, I took the top panel off out of curiosity to look inside when it arrived. This amp is a goddamn work of art, I’ve never seen amp guts (if that’s the best term?) so clean and organized.

Brad killed it with this.

You didn’t happen to take any photos?

I was going to say, to tide you over until we get pics of the Sarno preamp, here's a gut shot of my FYD JG Special Reverb 1X12 combo. But, in fact, BookieMK2 posted a gut shot already earlier in this thread.