I am back, folks. My system was the third most talked about system after Mike Levine's and Albert Porter's.
For some personal reasons I took a break from audio. But I am back with good news and not so thrilling news. The not so thrilling news is that the system is unchanged. And the good news is that it is so hard to improve it, regardless of the price -- I do not know what to upgrade, except may be cables -- as I hit the peak performance from my perspective. The sound thrills me still every time I listen. Still, 140plus tubes, embedded in the finest of amps and pre-amp driving a legendary speaker that can give a good run for money to speakers costing $100k plus, all making heat and magic at the same time. Wow, life is good.
Acknowledgements:
There are several people I wish to acknowledge who have helped me a great deal in building this system:
1. Charlie, who designed one of the finest preamps. Although, TRL Dude is marginally better, the Charlie X-2 will stay with me for ever and will continue to provide listening pleasures
2, Paul Weitzel of Tube Research Labs (TRL) for his helping on tuning the amps and on his feedback on many other technical aspects of the system at the micro and macro level.
3. David Royalty for building nice wooden battery casing for the TRL moded Sony CD player and also for numerous technical feedbacks.
4. Ivan Li of Hong Kong for showing me the insight into planar speaker placement.
5. Steve Dobbins of Xact audio for coming all the way from Idaho to install the tonearm and overall turntable tune up.
6. many visitors who have graced my listening room with their presence.
7. All audio friends who are not mentioned above.
8. Audiogoners who continue to post interesting and thought provoking comments here.
The finest cap I have yet to hear in electronics is the new Jupiter copper foil cap. Tops Duelund CAST in every application I have used them thus far. The speaker values are due out soon. They are very special indeed and affordable.
Bypass caps have the best chance of providing nice sound quality improvements when used on large value electrolytic caps in the power supply. When total capacitance needs exceed what film caps offer, this is the very best option to improve the sound.
Bypass caps types and brands impact the sound and one must experiment to find the sweet spot combination.
I have often wondered if dampening a good Mundorf cap as mentioned above in plumbers putty, sand, etc... would give the CAST effect? I doubt it as Duelund does it inside the cap where it matters more I would think......
They are only too expensive as they have no real competition until now with Jupiter. If the Jupiter's are as good as the Beta testers say, and they are lower priced as expected, then we will all pay less for CAST quality sound.
CAST type sound in a capacitor really sound not cost $1000's should it? It's a capacitor, not a entire amp!
Chadeffect nailed it and what a great response. Nice job. They sound great, but are way overpriced in terms of what's inside. Cut one in half and look! I have seen pictures of this and there is nothing very special inside compared to other caps. Well built, compressed cap.
G Diva, the noise is not background noise or hiss or anything like that. Once you have them in your system will indeed be rid of artifacts/noise you had no idea was there. Look forward to your comments once completed and burned in for at least 100 hours.
When you get a chance look at my Dude as I have other ideas for you.
50 hours of break in on the CAST caps gives you a sense of where things are going and is better sounding than 4 hours for sure. I have not experienced the need for 400-700 hours on the smaller values for electronics. 200 hours is good on a .22 uf Duelund cap. Burn in will be slower for a larger value cap as part of a speaker crossover!
One other thing. Jupiter is three weeks away from selling a capacitor that according to all the beta testers sounds better than the Duelund CAST and a lower price. We will soon see if that is true. Values for electronics up to 1 uf.
The flat stacked version for speakers are said to be a couple of months away.
Yes, be careful around those big blue caps as without bleeder resistors they can hold 400 volts for many, many days. The same is true in your Dude with the large can cap on that tube regulator. Be careful and bleed the caps as you mention. Oh my, you are fortunate the 400v did not do more harm to you. Thank God.
The Duelund caps in your Dude will improve the Dude's resolution and give a black, black, background from which the music will emerge like never before. It's as if you have rid your system of noise you thought was never there. All aspects of your music will improve with instruments sounding more real and natural. Highs will soar higher and will do so with ease and natural tone.
You are in for a treat. Start burning them in now in a second system or using a $5 used boom box. They will take 50 hours to relax and 200 hours or so to fully burn in.
Very nice system and I want one set of your amps! I am a long time TRL owner and still love my Dude! Do you find any particular 6sn7 tube sounds best in your system?
