Thanks Ghosthouse and jond! I have sifted through the comments over on the head-fi site before. It rambles on some but some good info in there. I'll keep rolling with it for another week and see what happens. I am going to switch back to my SE cables and see what that does.
Preamp help for First Watt J2/ZU Omens combo
Hi, I'm an all analog guy. Just a turntable with a phono pre. I bought a First Watt J2 a couple of months ago and can't seem to find the right preamp. My speakers are high efficiency ZU Audio Omen Mk2's. I tried a luminous audio axiom passive and while the midrange would blow you away not much else was there. I also tried a Schiit Freya which comes with a passive and tube side....passive side real weak and the tube side is like drinking from a fire hydrant. It's detailed but really in your face and forward. Very fatiguing. The people with Pass/First Watt all say a PASS preamp will do the trick like an older X-1 or the like but those are expensive still and kinda out of my budget right now. Plus, buying used there is not much of a return policy if it doesn't work out. Trying to keep it $1000 or less. But, it needs to sound right too so If I need to jump up I could. Any help would be greatly appreciated!
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Except for late night low volume listening, I also noticed the Freya doesn’t have the oomph in passive and FET modes to get the attention of my SEP 12 watt per side amp, but the tube stage has plenty of gain. My previous preamp has a 12 db boost/cut I clearly used on the "boost" setting so the Freya was initially worrisome...I only use the tube mode anyway so now I don’t care. I replaced the stock tubes with new Tung Sol 6SN7GTBs that sound fine (and I had an unused pair already) and it’s not fatiguing at all…it actually got better sounding as the Freya, the tubes, and a new pair of speakers possibly broke in somewhat. I might collect a little pile of NOS 6SN7s (I have couple of Amperex tubes I like a lot that I use in my power amp) eventually to experiment with, but the Tung Sols are staying for now. Headfi does have a pile of info which taken as a whole is a bit much. |
I have a Nuforce st200 amp with Zu Omen Defs. When I was waiting on my Rogue RP-5 Pre to get repaired, I use my Pro-Ject S2 Dac as a pre (only digital inputs). I was really impressed how it sounded. In fact, if it had all the analog in's, I would probably be happy enough. Anyway, Pro-Ject has this preamp http://www.audioadvisor.com/prodinfo.asp?number=PRMAPRE. AA has a good return policy. Overseas, (the Pro-jects come with universal plug adaptors for power any part of the world, this pre looks tempting: http://www.audioaffair.co.uk/pro-ject-pre-box-ds2-analogue-pre-amplifier? This Preamp has gotten decent reviews: https://www.google.com/search?q=Nuforce+preamp&rlz=1C5CHFA_enUS721US721&source=lnms&tbm=... Good Luck |
If you can pull it off, get the Linear Tube Audio MicroZOTL 2.0 preamp with the linear PSU option. It will be little more than your $1k budget but it is as good as any $20k preamp out there. I have just replaced my $18k Audio Note preamp with this amazing MicroZOTL 2.0 and I love it to the core. It will be a great match. |
What phono preamp do you have? The matching between that and the line preamp is also a consideration. The J2 gain figure also appears to be a higher than average and its behavior is just like a current-source tube amplifier so most high-gain preamps will probably overload the system causing harshness. It should sound real nice with the full-range single driver speakers like Zu. |
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