CES & THE Show 2011 • Hot Product

The Convergent Audio Technology (CAT) Statement ($72,000/pair) started off as special one-of-a-kind "hot rod" mono amplifiers that were part of CAT head Ken Stevens' personal system. They used the output-transformer cores that Ken felt were the very best, but he decided against using them in a production amplifier because of their expense. But, as often happens, others heard about the amps and wanted them, so Ken decided to produce them, adding special low-loss power capacitors in the output stage. The Statements use 16 6550C tubes per chassis to produce 150 watts, but as with other CAT amps, they seem to have limitless power available. At CES, they sounded voluptuous and endlessly dynamic driving Vandersteen 5A speakers.