Wavelength Audio and the man behind it, Gordon Rankin, have pioneered the development of the single-ended triode (SET) amplifiers. Their latest designs show this technology at its finest. The sound of their systems is fast, detailed, and sweet, with the palpable midrange typical of the best SET amplifiers. A pioneer in their field, their designs offer warmth and personality.

The early beginnings by Stephaen on 6moons.com:
In 1975, Gordon Rankin heard his first real stereo: "Marantz tube stuff and AR1s with a Thorens table," sez he. He's since made over 1,000 tube amplifiers and hundreds of tubed DACs, phono preamplifiers and speakers. When asked if he agrees with Harry Pearson's belief that recreating the sound of live acoustic music being played in real space is the ultimate goal, his reply is to the point: "No, I just want to enjoy the music."
It was in fact through Pearson's The Absolute Sound that I first heard of Wavelength Audio when that print 'zine granted Gordon's Cardinal SET the Best Component of 1994 award. Of course, the Chief Scientist of Wavelength had been honing his chops since long before then.

Take a look what Dr. Jules L. Coleman has to say about Gordon Rankin:
In addition to designing highly acclaimed amplifiers, Gordon Rankin - the man behind Wavelength Audio - has engineered and built high sensitivity loudspeakers and custom guitar amplifiers. He also invests in projects that support musicians in his native Cincinnati and is an avid, if not yet accomplished, guitarist and collector of vintage guitars. Most of our e-mails over the past few months have been about vintage electric guitars, not audio gear.


Gordon Rankin and USB DACs? How did that happen?

Short answer from Art Dudley's Stereophile Listening #33:
Gordon Rankin, who has a background in mainframe computer design, had recently built a custom universal serial bus (USB) hardware controller for a company that was itself developing a sound-to-PC interface, and he was inspired to build a similar device to deliver the music stored on a person's computer hard drive to his or her high-end audio system. Rankin wasn't the first to make that leap—some companies, especially in the pro audio field, had already brought upgraded soundcards to the market—but he may have been the first to create such a thing for the audio perfectionist: "Most of those products go from the USB connection standard to an S/PDIF environment, and then to an input receiver, but I didn't want to do that. I designed my converter to go straight from the USB connection to the Philips TDA1543 chip."