VINIUS AUDIO TVC-05 MAGNETIC VOLUME CONTROL

In the 80s when I was first getting into HiFi there was a move away from tone controls and anything else in the signal path that may degrade the sound. It’s a philosophy that rang true with me and my first system that I could call a real HiFi system was made up, in part, of a Musical Fidelity The Preamp that had a volume knob and a couple of switches and that fed its signal into a Crimson Electric amplifier. It was pretty good sounding if I recall correctly and the whole “less is more” concept sort of followed me through my HiFi buying journey. The Vinius Audio TVC-05 from Poland takes this minimalist approach to the nth degree and the unit is stripped back to the max with only a volume knob, one input, and one output. Before I even start to review it I kind of like the whole idea behind this preamplifier, though its ultra pared-back approach doesn’t leave you much scope for anything other than one source! For those that do want more inputs then Vinius Audio does a couple more products to cater for three RCA or XLR inputs, but you cannot mix and match these. They also do units with remotes but having spoken to them at length, they do suggest that you forego a remote if absolute purity of sound is what is most important to you.

FEATURES AND BUILD OF VINIUS TVC-05 PREAMPLIFIER

The unit we had arrived triple-boxed and in a Vinius labeled black back. Taking it out of the bag you immediately get to appreciate that this preamplifier looks absolutely lovely and is beautifully finished. The highly polished wooden front panel with a slightly orange hue looks great and is adorned with a single, large volume knob – there is no source selector as there is only one input. You get all this for €7400 for the RCA version and a bit more for other versions.

Around the back of this relatively large box (360 x 400 x 125 (wdh)) and on a wooden panel finished to the same very high standard as the front panel, there is one input pair and one output pair of XLRs. There is no power inlet as this is a passive, or rather TVC design.

That large knob that dominates the front panel has 24 steps with each step equating to a 2db step. It has a very satisfying click to it.

The interesting stuff of this volume control (it can’t really be described

Reviewed by Stuart Smith