Primaluna Audio is a small Dutch company that, having entered the market in 2005, managed to make high-end tube amplifiers accessible to Europeans, and then to audiophiles everywhere.
Its founder, Herman van den Dungen, invested all his 30 years of experience in the field of High-End equipment into the new company Primaluna. For many years he promoted extreme high-end components in the Benelux countries, having founded Durob Audio BV early in his career (in 1975), one of the very first importers of High-End products into Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg. He also played an active role in the creation of cartridges (phono heads) for Kiseki vinyl turntables and Milltek tonearms, PinPoint acoustic cones and many other accessories. Herman’s team includes such High-End veterans as Marcel Croese, who for many years designed equipment for the Swiss company Goldmund, as well as Dutch engineers who worked at Sphinx.
Herman van der Dungen
Croese designed custom transformers for Primaluna amplifiers in collaboration with one of the most experienced designers of such devices in the United States. Primaluna Audio also employs Upscale Audio’s Kevin Deal, who created the ProLogue One integrated amplifier with Marcel Croese. Unlike many other companies, Primaluna included in its development team a group of local (Dutch) High-End dealers and buyers who meticulously evaluate every step of the engineering team. Prototypes, intermediates and final products are tested in a real-world environment before being released into production. The emergence of a new High-End company in Europe in 2005, and especially with tube amplifiers, immediately raises the question: how does a European company, burdened with the high cost of labor in “euro”, manage to offer products at a reasonable price? Very simply – like many other much larger brands, Primaluna Audio has located its production in China. She managed to find two manufacturers capable of producing equipment in accordance with the strictest quality requirements. The fact is that the reliability and quality of products manufactured in China have increased many times over the past 10 years – much to the chagrin of Western manufacturers who have not yet used their services.
One of Herman’s main ideas was to shift the main tasks of after-sales service to the design of the device itself. Distributors, dealers and customers should not waste their valuable time on setup and repair. A failed lamp should never cause damage to the circuit. The maximum that the owner will do is replace the lamp or fuse. When replacing a tube (which many audiophiles like to do themselves), no adjustment of the bias current is required. The fact is that the company’s engineers came up with a servo system to stabilize the bias at the required level (“sustained auto bias”) with additional protection of the circuit by a fuse. To replace the Prologue and Dialogue series amplifiers that have earned an excellent reputation, the Dutch company PrimaLuna has released a new series – EVO. Today it contains four models of pre-amplifiers, integrated amplifiers and power amplifiers.
