Vintage tube guys


I was an SS guy till not that long ago on vintage Klipsch Lascala's. (now with Duelund VSF and CAST caps)

After hearing a Fisher x101d and it blowing the doors off my SS pre and amp that was a $10k (new) combo. I kept the SS system for a few months thinking I would have second thoughts. Bought some more Fishers (after taking out the output transformer in the x101d) 500c x101st and x202 none have sounded as good as the x101d (do not know on the x202 as it is being fixed right now) but all better then my SS.

My question is you do not hear much from say Marantz 7c Fisher 400c guys etc. Are they happy? I was in Audio la la land till the output transformer went. Amp was so quiet I could hear around instruments!

The Marantz goes for big $ is that becuase collectible or sound reasons? Not much talk about them either? Is that because how can you be excited over 50yr old gear!

I am thinking about Fisher 400c or 400CX, CX-2. Any happy owners out there?
volleyguy

Showing 1 response by jsadurni

I do not consider myself a Vintage guy, but my refrence at the moment are a pair of monoblock LeakTL12 0.1 amps, I have tried a LOT and I mean a lot of tube amps, vintage and current. I cannot say vintage is always better but some vintage models are really hard to beat once they are brought to date.
They do need a lot of parts changed to start sounding properly. I have changed all resistors for Caddocks mainly and all signal caps for Mundorf Silver-gold. the Power supply caps are the original paper in oil.
I have compared these amps to a lot of current amps also and I always liked them better.
Designs in tube amps dont really change that much, the quality of parts is important and point to point wiring, etc.

I also have a couple of Fisher amps somewhere on my closet and have tired some others, let me tell you IMHO the Fisher X100 (or X101) with the EL84 tubes is the best one.

Check out Mapleshade Audio web page...