Capacitors in Cary PH302 phono amp

Tobes, My experience with the original MIT caps you have are they are better than the older Hovland & Auricaps which are vague and murky - so I wouldn't go back to original. The RTX are very good, but word of warning, used in speaker crossover we have found the internal impedance/inductance characteristics were drifting. Discussions with Richard Marsh shed no light on why. We have compared these original MIT in both tube pre and speaker xover to Hovland ( H was murky ), Mundorf Supreme ( MIT had much better timing and around the same transparency - therefore MIT at 1/4 the price is way better value, Mundorf Silver and Oil ( this had much better timing than the Supreme and I would rate it better than the MIT ). My view is go for Mundorf Silver/Oil, Audio Note Copper Foil ( if you dont like silver ), or Teflon. Beware if you go Teflon - they take weeks to run in. Cheap option is go to MIT PPFXS.

Tobes, I wouldn't lose too much sleep. My Marantz 7 still uses the original MIT caps I put in 10 years ago and it has seen off my ARC and Jadis preamps quite handily. The 3 caps you mention are all well regarded, what I know from experience is that both the RTX and Mundorf maintain the very good timing of the MIT PP... just read heaps and go with your gut instinct. You can always put the current caps back in if you dont like the result.

Tobes - good luck and let us know how it goes. Will be interested in what you think, as it may be time to give my preamp a birthday as well.

Tobes, well done, Just to emphasize Rebs comment on bypassing, I would not recommend bypassing the Mundorf as they are built as 2 capacitors in one body with interleaved windings to minimize inductance. Bypassing would probably negate the design.

Tobes - I just saw your photos - I would suggest you push the caps as far away as possible from the tubes to minimize heat transfer.

Hi Tobes - we must sound like a bunch of old women with our comments. Next step if you want to go further would be to replace any Solen's in the signal path. Even the MIT will easily surpass these in speed, timing, dynamics and your pre will just get better and better.