Description
Gryphon Commander : Preamplifier
Launch Pad for Commander was Gryphon’s brilliant Pandora, widely regarded as one of the world’s finest preamplifiers. Commander shares Pandora’s Dual-Mono layout with four separate chassis—two apiece for signal and power supply circuits—single-ended Class A input buffer (which passes the signal through the fewest possible parts) and zero global negative feedback. These designflourishes yield a sound that is exceptionally transparent, fast, natural and open: qualities that achieve their highest expression in Commander.
Naturally, Commander embodies major engineering advances including a high-precision voltage reference which delivers approximately 50 times lower noise than Pandora. A pair of fully discrete, linear power supplies (one per channel) are dedicated to analog circuitry while a third feeds the digital control circuits, maintaining absolute mechanical separation and electrical isolation between digital and analog sections. Weighing over 50 kilos, Commander’s dual-mono power supply chassis includes four custom-made toroidal transformers engineered for minimal noise. Two of these (one per channel) power the dual-mono preamplifier circuits while the second pair are reserved for upcoming Gryphon source components, ensuring a future-proof upgrade path.
Extensive use of aluminum chassis components lays a solid foundation for performance, yielding non-resonant enclosures that minimize both mechanical and electrical degradation, providing optimal working conditions for Commander’s finely-tuned amplifier circuits. Unique among preamplifiers, Commander’s constrained-layer-damped bottom plate—a “Sandwich” of three individual layers of Kerrock, bitumen and steel—reduce vibrtation to an absolute minimum. All amplifier and analogue power supply circuit boards float above these bottom plates on purpose-engineered isolators. A quartet of Gryphon Atlas Spikes under each chassis move resonance control even closer to theoretical perfection.
Needless to say, every part of Commander is the finest available: from the Charcroft Audio ultra-precision resistors used in our volume control to the premium, oversized Mundorf MCap® ZN foil capacitors specified for local power supply decoupling to the four custom-made 36VA toroidal transformers, no expense has been spared ensuring performance and build quality that defines the state-of-the-art.
Specifications :
- Input Impedance, balanced: 18kΩ
- Input Impedance, single-ended: 12kΩ
- Output impedance: 7Ω
- Bandwidth (-3dB): 0.1Hz to 1.5MH
- Gain: +18dB
- THD + N: 0,003% @ 1kHz and BW 10Hz-30kHz, balanced output
- Max output level, balanced: 19Vrms
- Max output level, single-ended: 9,5Vrms
- Max input level, balanced: 20Vrms
- Max input level, single-ended: 10Vrms
- Power consumption: ≤ 0,5W (standby), 90W (idle)
- AC voltage range 110-120V or 220-240V
- MENU-controlled functions:
- Volume Max Level
- Voume Start Level
- Balance, Left/Right. (6dB in 1dB steps)
- Output level: “Normal” or “-6dB”
- Display Intensity: (100%-75%-50%-25%, Auto Dim and Auto OFF)
- Green Bias setup
- Infra-Red source (Front or Rear Panel)
- PSU option out enable
- Input Level Match
- Input Naming
- Dedicate Input 4 (XLR) or input 5 (RCA) to Volume-Bypass AV-input
- Restore Settings
- Dimensions:
- Dimensions Preamplifier unit, WxHxD: 48 x 23,6 x 45,5 cm, net unit weight: 30,5kg
- Dimensions PSU unit, WxHxD: 48 x 23,6 x 44 cm, net unit weight: 38,2kg
- Shipping dimensions: Two crates; each 59 x 57 x 38 cm, respectively 45kg and 52kg
