Hafler DH-200A
A factory-wired DH-200 that carried the kit-amp legend straight into the showroom.
Overview
The DH-200A was the factory-assembled version of Hafler's DH-200 power amplifier. The price gap between the two says a lot. Throughout the early 1980s, mail-order dealers advertised the DH-200A at $429.95, while the DH-200K kit sat at $329.95. That hundred dollars was the labor you saved by picking up a soldering iron yourself. A further step up, the DH-200AE at $439.95, appears in the same dealer listings without explanation of what the suffix added. For the buyer who wanted the Hafler circuit but not the project, the A-model was the answer.
The amplifier itself is the design that earned Hafler its following. High Fidelity (March 1980, p.44) rated the DH-200 at 20 dBW - 100 watts per channel - and singled out its use of power MOS FETs as the thing that set it apart from any other American amplifier. That MOSFET output stage is the core of the DH-200 lineage, and the DH-200A carries it in a fully built chassis rather than a bag of parts. The period press treated the DH-200 as a genuine high-end contender at a working-man's price, and the A-model inherited that reputation.
Dealers treated it as a staple. Oxford Audio Consultants ran the DH-200A in its standing Hafler listings across 1980, 1981, and 1982. The amp also turned up in system recommendations. Sound by Singer in New York built a sub-$2,200 reference system around the DH-200A paired with a Rega Planar 2 and Hafler's DH-101A preamp. It was pitched as an "audiophile best sound per dollar" build.
Collectors note that the DH-200A sits in an odd spot in the Hafler line. It's the ready-to-run sibling of one of the most-modified amplifiers of its era. Musical Concepts sold an amp mod kit specifically for the DH-200, and Hafler's own DH-203 modification kit was listed at $11.95 for a single kit or $9.95 each in quantity. All that aftermarket attention means surviving DH-200As range from bone-stock to heavily reworked. Buyers should look closely at what's been done inside before paying a premium.
The DH-200A has none of the convenience features of a receiver. It's a bare power amplifier, and it expects a preamp like the DH-101A or DH-110 to feed it. Owners report that's the point: the money went into the output stage, not into switches. The MOSFET design is also the reason the amp has stayed serviceable decades later. The circuit is straightforward enough that a competent tech can keep one running, which is more than can be said for a lot of period solid-state.
The weak spot is documentation. The DH-200A's own spec sheet is thin in the historical record. The period listings establish the price and the model's place in the line, and the High Fidelity review establishes the 100-watt-per-channel MOSFET topology. Detailed distortion, damping, and bandwidth figures for the A-model specifically aren't well preserved. Buyers evaluating one should treat the published DH-200 numbers as the baseline and verify the individual unit's condition.
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