The sonic beauty of valves...

[Kubs]

I admire how active you are in terms of taking the time out to audition (even with a young family). I too have young kids and the weekend is taken up by them, leaving no room to audition ... My time will come (again).

You must have a decent dealer nearby which is half the battle.

 

[ellisdj]

I dont get why you would do that Gazzip - why would you change bits around in your main system?

That might come across as rude - I dont mean it like that - just asking

Hope you don't mind but I can answer that question from my perspective and that is that I find my ears seem to get used to the sound of a specific system configuration in a particular room. Having two systems (and two different listening rooms) means I can swap kit around which makes a difference to the sound, which I find makes the music I listen to a little more interesting.

Having 2 systems is a luxury, having substitutes for each system in case one component gets tired is even more so 🙂

I have never done it so I cant get my head around it - thats likely because my system is av biased - therefore there are very much limitations to what actually sounds good for music, and the faff of changing things over with so many connections, and lack of space its a non starter.

Quickly swopping a pre over with just a few wires is a different kettle of fish + there are so many more good choices maybe that makes sense. Why only enjoy one woman when you can enjoy several .... something like that anyway

 

[chebby]

If you had for whatever reason an option to use a valve pre or a valve power but not both, which would you feel offers the most benefits in terms of getting the valve sound? (Though maybe this is one of those questions where you could ask a dozen valve enthusiasts and not get a majority answer).

Thinking of a valve pre-amp for those DM10s Major?

Please do it, I beg you!

 

[ID.]

Valves are a bit of a gap in my experience. The only system I've heard was the cheapest Luxman valve setup which sounded pretty good with certain music, but too soft for most music I listen to.

At some point I may dabble with a valve pre for my actives, but perhaps the products I'm thinking of are too cheap to really give an indication of what valves can do.

Whilst it's true that some Valve Amps could be accused of sounding soft with flabby bass, when you get one that is properly worked out the effect is astonishing.

Albums like REM's 'Automatic for the People' through my S8 is almost a religious experience!

I've read various reviews, mainly of tube headphone amps admittedly, that gave me the impression that they don't have to sound flabby and lush. In the future I may end up playing around with some things like the Schiit tube headphone amps that can also work as preamps together with my actives just for sh!ts and giggles as a relatively cheap introduction. Currently I'm pretty sure exposed tubes are too much of a temptation/risk with my little kids.

 

[MajorFubar]

Thinking of a valve pre-amp for those DM10s Major?

Please do it, I beg you!

I wonder if they do valve phono-stages...

 

[Infiniteloop]

Thinking of a valve pre-amp for those DM10s Major?

Please do it, I beg you!

I wonder if they do valve phono-stages...

Im pretty sure Unison Research do and have for a long time, so second hand may be an option. I haven't checked, but I think Icon Audio do them too.

 

[Al ears]

Thinking of a valve pre-amp for those DM10s Major?

Please do it, I beg you!

I wonder if they do valve phono-stages...

Im pretty sure Unison Research do and have for a long time, so second hand may be an option. I haven't checked, but I think Icon Audio do them too.

Icon Audio are well reknown for the tube phono stages, expensive though they may be.

 

[Al ears]

Thinking of a valve pre-amp for those DM10s Major?

Please do it, I beg you!

I wonder if they do valve phono-stages...

Im pretty sure Unison Research do and have for a long time, so second hand may be an option. I haven't checked, but I think Icon Audio do them too.

Icon Audio are well reknown for the tube phono stages, expensive though they may be. I have a feeling though that the Major was joking....... then again perhaps not.

 

[MajorFubar]

Icon Audio are well reknown for the tube phono stages, expensive though they may be. I have a feeling though that the Major was joking....... then again perhaps not.

Not at all, it seems like it could be an excellent experiment, though even second hand would probably be over-budget in any case, as it has been made very clear I have spent the spare money for the forseeable future.

 

[Gazzip]

...it has been made very clear I have spent the spare money for the forseeable future.

Great! So now that you have spent the spare money you can spend the essential money you put aside for buying new hi-fi...

 

[MajorFubar]

...it has been made very clear I have spent the spare money for the forseeable future.

Great! So now that you have spent the spare money you can spend the essential money you put aside for buying new hi-fi...

I'll give you Mrs Fubar's email address, how are your negotiating skills? 🙂

 

[davedotco]

...it has been made very clear I have spent the spare money for the forseeable future.

Great! So now that you have spent the spare money you can spend the essential money you put aside for buying new hi-fi...

I'll give you Mrs Fubar's email address, how are your negotiating skills? 🙂

You need to threaten her with withdrawing your 'male' services.

Mrs DDC always caves in when I threaten to do that, the prospect of having to do her own ironing is too terrible to contemplate...*kiss2*

 

[nopiano]

...it has been made very clear I have spent the spare money for the forseeable future.

Great! So now that you have spent the spare money you can spend the essential money you put aside for buying new hi-fi...

I'll give you Mrs Fubar's email address, how are your negotiating skills? 🙂

You need to threaten her with withdrawing your 'male' services.

Mrs DDC always caves in when I threaten to do that, the prospect of having to do her own ironing is too terrible to contemplate...*kiss2*

PMSL!

 

[MajorFubar]

...it has been made very clear I have spent the spare money for the forseeable future.

Great! So now that you have spent the spare money you can spend the essential money you put aside for buying new hi-fi...

I'll give you Mrs Fubar's email address, how are your negotiating skills? 🙂

You need to threaten her with withdrawing your 'male' services.

Mrs DDC always caves in when I threaten to do that, the prospect of having to do her own ironing is too terrible to contemplate...*kiss2*

LOLOL!! *biggrin*

 

[steve_1979]

Thinking of a valve pre-amp for those DM10s Major?

Please do it, I beg you!

I've actually considered that more than a few times just to see what they would sound like.

 

[Macspur]

Really enjoyed this thread. Have considered tubes myself in the past, but once I got the Accuphase decided against it... brands I considered were Mastersound or Leben.

Mac

www.macsmusic.blogbubble.net

 

[davedotco]

I have a mate on the pro-side who is sort of half american.

He uses the tiny Equator D5s as a rather spectacular nearfield setup, but with a Maverick dac preamp, and he uses the tube (valve) output.

http://www.mav-audio.com/base/product/tube_magic_d1

 

[Gazzip]

Albums like REM's 'Automatic for the People' through my S8 is almost a religious experience!

Got this on now. Good times... *drinks*

 

[Gazzip]

Albums like REM's 'Automatic for the People' through my S8 is almost a religious experience!

Got this on now. Good times... *drinks*

The CD has got green pen on it. Remember those? The ones designed to absorb "laser scatter". What a mug I was... *lol*

 

[MajorFubar]

The CD has got green pen on it. Remember those? The ones designed to absorb "laser scatter". What a mug I was... *lol*

Apparently it was proved to genuinely reduce read errors caused by said laser scatter. But what they conveniently didn't tell you is the Reed-Solomon error checking built into the specification of red-book CDs already perfectly recreates any loss caused by read errors unless they are bad enough to create a clearly-audible glitch or skip, which no green pen will fix anyway, so it was pointless by and large. But hey why let facts get in the way of a great marketing ploy 🙂

 

[MajorFubar]

I have a mate on the pro-side who is sort of half american.

Which half, his legs or his torso

(I'm here all week folks.)

 

[davedotco]

I have a mate on the pro-side who is sort of half american.

Which half, his legs or his torso

(I'm here all week folks.)

The half that thinks pancakes go with bacon and maple syrup...

The half that thinks football is a game played mainly with the hands...

The half that thinks Budweiser beer is american...

The half that like most americans, does not understand the 'Infield fly rule*'.

* The baseball equivilent of the offside rule.