Claritycap ESA 630V - various values for Polk speakers

heiney9

I just wondered if you had heard them compared to the Clarity, it wasn't clear in your post. Great deal on some great caps. I have used both and I like them both. Clarity PX line has been my go to for budget oriented and I'm thinking of picking up a pair of ESA's for coupling duty in a dac.

Enjoy, new caps, etc, give new life to already great speakers.

H9

villock

heiney9 wrote: »

I just wondered if you had heard them compared to the Clarity, it wasn't clear in your post. Great deal on some great caps. I have used both and I like them both. Clarity PX line has been my go to for budget oriented and I'm thinking of picking up a pair of ESA's for coupling duty in a dac.

Enjoy, new caps, etc, give new life to already great speakers.

H9

Thanks

quadzilla

heiney9 wrote: »

I just wondered if you had heard them compared to the Clarity, it wasn't clear in your post. Great deal on some great caps. I have used both and I like them both. Clarity PX line has been my go to for budget oriented and I'm thinking of picking up a pair of ESA's for coupling duty in a dac.

Enjoy, new caps, etc, give new life to already great speakers.

H9

I've heard them as coupling caps in an apples-to-apples comparison, and the ESAs blow the Sonicaps away. The only other comparison I can make is in my CRS+ TL'ed with Sonicaps, Mills, and RDO-198s vs the Claritycaps, Deulands, and RDO-198s in my 2.3 TLs, and again, the Sonicaps are a distant second across the board. But that's not apples-to-apples, so YMMV.

headrott

heiney9 wrote: »

So you've heard the Sonicaps and these are much better? It's a given they are better than stock.

H9

While I am at about 275 hours on my 2.3TL Duelund/ESA boards, I have done a direct comparison to Sonicaps/Mills and can say (already, but as I said possibly not fully broken in) that they are better than Sonicaps. As stated by villock, the bass is absolutely better than Sonicaps. the high end is smooth and slightly warm and the clarity and detail is the bestpart about the whole thing. The sound is completely clear, smooth and there is about 25% to30% more detail then Sonicap/Mills combo. This si a direct (apples to apples as Rob put it) comparison in the 2.3TL's. The Duelund/ESA combo is better. Period. If you are planning on redoing your 2.3TL crossovers, get a set of Rob's ESA's.

Greg

heiney9

Too bad it can't be more apples to apples. I'm sure the Dueland has a lot more influence than you realize. I love Clarity caps but putting the Dueland in the mix could skew results. No matter as I'm not arguing the fact because I have had success with both brands. I am thinking about redoing the high pass on my SDA's with Clarity, but I am not spending that kind of money on the Dueland resistors. I guess until someone compares just the caps to each other w/ the same resistors we will never know for sure if the difference is that great.

H9

quadzilla

heiney9 wrote: »

Too bad it can't be more apples to apples. I'm sure the Dueland has a lot more influence than you realize. I love Clarity caps but putting the Dueland in the mix could skew results. No matter as I'm not arguing the fact because I have had success with both brands. I am thinking about redoing the high pass on my SDA's with Clarity, but I am not spending that kind of money on the Dueland resistors. I guess until someone compares just the caps to each other w/ the same resistors we will never know for sure if the difference is that great.

H9

I can safely say that, at least as far as coupling caps, there can be no doubt that the ESAs far exceed the Sonicaps. The replacement gave me must more extension at both ends, and took out a bad hump in the bass, as well as an increase in detail across the spectrum. And the Duelands have nothing to do with the mids or bass in the 2.3 TL xovers, so I think it's fair to say that the ESAs do beat the Sonicaps by a fair margin. In any case, the ESAs are now my go-to cap across the board, at least until I can afford some MR series.

quadzilla

blanking double post.

headrott

heiney9 wrote: »

Too bad it can't be more apples to apples. I'm sure the Dueland has a lot more influence than you realize. I love Clarity caps but putting the Dueland in the mix could skew results. No matter as I'm not arguing the fact because I have had success with both brands. I am thinking about redoing the high pass on my SDA's with Clarity, but I am not spending that kind of money on the Dueland resistors. I guess until someone compares just the caps to each other w/ the same resistors we will never know for sure if the difference is that great.

H9

Brock, I am sure the Duelunds have a big influence on the sound, especially the detail in the high end. As I satated before, if the resistors needed to be changed out every year and a half I would not be willing to spend the amount of money on them. But, since you only need to change them out every 15 to 20 years (not sure what life span they have for sure) I believe the kind of money it taked is well worth the sound you get. I was thinking that the high end would be brighter and harsher than what they are. As I stated, they are slightly warm, smooth clear and very detailed. Certainly not harsh, grainy and bright. I was definately expecting them to be on the bright side, but that isn't the case.

You are correct, unfortunately we cannot compare the ESA/Mills combo to Duelund/ESA to Sonicap/Duelund to Sonicap/Mills. It would be very interesting what the differences are between all of those combos. Anyone want to spend the money and time doing the comparisons?:eek::cheesygrin: My comparison was simply ESA/Duelund and Sonicap/Mills. My results are that the ESA/Duelund combo is better than Sonicap/Mills be a fair amount. Tonality, imaging, detail, and clarity are all better in this comparison. Some audio aspects are better than others in the comparison, but all (to some degree) are better.

Greg

Greg

Toolfan66

I have no regrets going with Dueland resistors, they transformed the detail, imagery and depth to a new high, the separation of instruments and the blacks that fill the room were worth every penny when it was all said and done..

As Greg stated they are smooth and slightly warm, there is no harshness or brightness if anything I would say the mills are closer to that then the duelands..

Yes it's one of those cost's that make you go what the hell am I doing.

Sometime this year I will start my Clarity Cap/Dueland crossover project but for now I am very happy with the work I have done on my 1.2tl's.

quadzilla

Bump, still have 2 sets for sale.

dracoskeeper

Quad, Sent you a pm, need paypal info to settle up...

quadzilla

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