I have the AA Cap Reference SE and my tubes are Philips, this does not mean the Philips sound better than the Sylvania, I think the Sylvania are just in short supply. I got some Sylvanias from Vacuum-Shop and another source from that part of the world. I contacted Tube World about getting mine Cryo treated but I'm just not sure it's worth it, Like I said, I think the Cryo might have been part of the selling point of the SE upgrade.
Audio Aero Capitole - 6021W subminiature tube ??
I would appreciate hearing from someone who can explain the performance of these tubes in the Capitole, including the typical life of the tubes, whether they are susceptible to becomming microphonic or noisy, and how to purchase or change them if necessary. I believe I read these are really small (like the diameter of a pencil) and that they are soldered onto the board. If that is true, is it then necessary to send the player back to the distributor or manufacturer if they need replaced, or are these readily available and set up for user installation? How many years is typical for the tubes to perform in the Capitole before replacement is necessary? Thanks.
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Soldering 6021wa tubes into the circuit. Audio aero tubes are soldered in with short leads and the tubes in vertical position. this may lead to some microphonics problems. personally i keep the leeds lonng and bent the wires so the tube are iin an horizontal position more or less floating position. I can give you some tubes for trial. good luck AJ van Doorn [email protected] |
i created the "SE"upgrade for initially the North American distributor: Globe Audio Distributors, then it was installed at the factory after most existing pre "SE" capitole, prestige and prima dac were upgraded in the field ,most in Canada at Globe and also at the tech in Arizona. The caps in the kit were Sonicap platinums, a silver composite/teflon film and foil cap. Careful listening experiments revealed unanimous overall improvement over the rel cap tft. Lesson # 1, all caps that are film and foil teflon do not sound the same. V caps performance according to 1 high profile boutique tube manufacturer were similar quality improvement over hovland musicap but different than the sonicap platinums. Sonicraft does not have any more of this value of cap. I have a dozen pair or so in storage,as well as the damping/mounting pads. We tried many nos 6021w but went back to the phillips jan and cryoed them,most upgraded and earl factory "se"will have these tubes except some of the early units that were upgraded in the field. Never did as careful, controlled listening tests on different tubes, consistency and supply being in favor of the jan philipps . Cryo tubes make a difference if you have a well sorted system with excellent cables(and yes good cryoed cables allow you to hear the difference more easily cryoed tubes make). It does the same thing ;sounds more resolved and refined, quieter, more relaxed,more involving 3d halograph sound. Cryoing tubes is not cheap so if was not worth the expenditure, we would not have done it. Everything in that "se"upgrade kit, made a difference. Also all caps were matched as well as tubes were tested/matched after cryo for symmetrical gain/noise /microphony. I produced the kits along with a well known high end audio tech/designer. Globe Audio distributed to their dealers and the initial factory production of "se". Did have some good results ourselves with sylvania gold 6021w and the few close friends with them. I think a Mark 1 Capitole has the same sylvania golds 15 years now, i'll check on that next time in Canada. |
Globe Audio is long gone. But Sedonix might be operational. I got a used Prima 2 dac last year( from Jody, former Globe owner)waiting for me in Canada. I plan to install Dueland cast caps. Rich at Signature sound mentioned that he tried some Dueland RS i think in a Capitole and liked the improvement over the se caps. In the last 10 years or so i've been mainly listening ,experimenting with NOS dacs using philips 1541, 1543, 1545. I felt that although upsampling dacs like AA Prima/Capitole have some interesting qualities, they seem to add some amusical noise in the high frequencies. Probably delta sigma dac noise shaping anomalies. Also going to compare a Berkeley Alpha dac with hdcd. Should be interesting comparing these 5 dacs. |
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