What audioman58 is saying is if you get the capacitors and a number of the resistors replaced in you PL amp with higher quality parts there is a very decent sized improvement in sound quality and he is totally correct. I will be having the caps in my HP integrated replaced with Jupitor caps in the next two weeks, can’t wait.
I have read on a number of occassions comments by people saying they sold their PL amp for various reasons, like they got bored with the el34 sound, yet they never bothered to try tube rolling. Their loss I reckon these amps were made for tube rolling, a PL amp with KT120’s or better still KT150’s has a completely different sound to one with either el34’s or KT88’s.
The big 150 tubes make the PL very dynamic and open without loosing to much of that smoothness you get with el34’s.
Also once you change the two centre 12au7’s for some NOS tubes, depending on brand and model, you can totally dial in your amp to sound the way you like it best for each genre of music and then change it again in less than a minute if for example you switch from heavy rock to jazz.
Rolling the main tubes in a PL amp has the same effect as buying and plugging in a totally different amp and changing the centre two 12au7’s is like changing to a different DAC in a SS system.
For those who have a Pl amp and don’t try tube rolling seriously you don’t know what you are missing.
... cheers.
I have read on a number of occassions comments by people saying they sold their PL amp for various reasons, like they got bored with the el34 sound, yet they never bothered to try tube rolling. Their loss I reckon these amps were made for tube rolling, a PL amp with KT120’s or better still KT150’s has a completely different sound to one with either el34’s or KT88’s.
The big 150 tubes make the PL very dynamic and open without loosing to much of that smoothness you get with el34’s.
Also once you change the two centre 12au7’s for some NOS tubes, depending on brand and model, you can totally dial in your amp to sound the way you like it best for each genre of music and then change it again in less than a minute if for example you switch from heavy rock to jazz.
Rolling the main tubes in a PL amp has the same effect as buying and plugging in a totally different amp and changing the centre two 12au7’s is like changing to a different DAC in a SS system.
For those who have a Pl amp and don’t try tube rolling seriously you don’t know what you are missing.
... cheers.