Reference Line performance – one owner, one showroom
A rare opportunity: the Burmester 218 power amplifier paired with the 111 Musiccenter, offered as a single ex-demonstration system at £24,900 – a saving of more than £51,000 against the combined retail price of £76,100.
Both units have served exclusively as demonstration pieces at Audio Lounge’s central London showroom in Marylebone.
Burmester 218 Power Amplifier
The 218 draws directly on the 159 – the largest and most powerful mono amplifier Burmester has ever built. The same clear lines, the same screwless lid, the same characteristic heat sinks: Reference Line design distilled into a stereo chassis that still fits a standard equipment rack.
Behind the fascia sits four decades of Berlin amplifier engineering. Class A input stages built on Burmester X-Amp technology feed a completely DC-coupled signal path – no sound-degrading capacitors anywhere in the chain. A generously dimensioned power supply delivers the current reserves to control any loudspeaker with total composure, while a high damping factor holds the drivers to account across the entire frequency range, even at the top end.
Switchable between stereo and mono operation, the 218 scales with ambition: run a single unit today, add a second for bridged monoblocks later.
Key features
- Completely symmetrical circuit design
- Class A input stages (Burmester X-Amp technology)
- DC-coupled signal path – no capacitors in the signal chain
- Switchable stereo / mono operation
- Protection circuits placed outside the signal path
- Stable into all loads across the full frequency range
- Remote on/off via Burmester devices (10 V DC trigger); Smart Home integration possible
Connections: balanced inputs (stereo or mono-bridged via adapter), unbalanced via optional adapter, DC trigger in/out, BurLink interface, solid screw-type loudspeaker terminals.
Burmester 111 Musiccenter
The 111 Musiccenter condenses an entire digital front end into one Reference Line chassis: high-end music server with 2 × 4 TB SSD storage, integrated preamplifier with three analogue and six digital inputs, and Burmester’s own digital-to-analogue conversion.
Rip, store, stream and play – all controlled through a logical, intuitive interface that puts a full music library at your fingertips without a rack full of boxes. The 111 partners the 218 as naturally in signal as in appearance, forming a complete Reference Line system in just two units plus loudspeakers.
