Damn you tube guys!!!

danger boy

i finally got my lazy **** down to the local musical instrument shop and purchased a new pair of Groove Tube GT-12AX7-R gold series tubes for my California Audio Labs Alpha tube DAC.

The tubes that were in the DAC i think were Mullards.. though i can't confirm that.. it doesn't say anything like that on the lettering. it only has a "M" on the underside of it.. and the white letting on the side says... 000-4004 CV4004 KQDD/K 84-05 so not sure if they are real Mullards or not.

Either way... i was never really that happy with them... bass was good.. mids were to forward and highs were slightly laid back.

Bam! forward to today when i installed the Groove Tubes. :eek: much better sound overall. Highs are cleaner and clearer, mids are not as forward and bass is still good. This CAL DAC is hooked up via coax digital cable from a NAD CDP. Out to a Kenwood preamp and then to a NAD amp and out to the SRS's.

With the old tubes the SDA's seemed to have lost quite a bit of their SDA effect. I played around the past few months with interconnects and speaker cables.. with only slighly improvement. Then today I installed the Groove Tubes and let them warm up for 30 minutes before listening to any CD's.

Right away i could notice an improvement in the SDA effect again. It was much more open and the soundstage was back. As i mentioned earlier about the highs, mids and bass.. it still holds true. I'm very pleased with these tubes. Of course.. now I want to try others, but these will def keep me happy for now.

Question. Do tubes lose their effectiveness over time? I don't have any kind of tube tester. I would assume.. and maybe this is wrong.. that tubes when near the end of their life will exhibit different characteristics then when new.

The Groove Tube web site says these tubes are "edgy", what does that even mean? Edgy?

Anyway, i just wanted to share my new found happiness with the tubes i tried today. More to come i'm sure.

audiobliss

Congratulations on regaining your system, haha. Glad you like your new tubes.

Early B.

Glad to hear someone else diggin' their Groove Tubes. After using several others in my Jolida amp, I found the GT 12AX7M's to be the best ones so far.

I'm also interested in the responses to your question about tubes losing their effectiveness over time.

Dennis Gardner

Some tubes can just muddy up the sound of already soft gear. I find Groove tubes and JJ teslas to actually add punch in a sweet way to the sound of my SDAs. Great bass with shimmering highs without the screech of biting SS gear. It just takes trial and error. I found Sovtek LPS and EH to be dull/flat in my phono pre and AE preamp.

Glad you found that magic combo, even in a DAC.

Dennis Gardner

edited

audiobliss

Umm, which thread are you in?

Dennis Gardner

I wondered where that XM radio post went!!!:eek:

PRC

Congratulations on your new find. I am new to the tube arena, and am interested in your responses. I have a Jolida amp and have used Telefunken 12AX7 tubes until just recently. I found the Telefunken's to have very defined highs, a little laid back mids and fair base. Overall they are detailed and dimensional with a decent sound stage. I do feel they are a bit forward and lack a bit of base. I am currently trying a set of TUNG-SOL tubes. They seem to have a bit more base but are not as smooth, but they are new. After reading your post, the Groove tubes sound like what I may be looking for.

Sorry, I don't know the answer to your question. The guys at EDI (my local dealer) tell me that within about 8 hours you can tell the general characteristics of a tube, but it may take a 100 hours before they break in and smooth out. They did mention that tube life can be very long, but finding the "perfect" tube is a trial and error process.

Good luck.

Patrick

danger boy

I've got lots to learn about tubes of course... but I don't want to get into anything to high end cost wise.. these Groove tubes were $30 for the pair. Right in line with my budget. I think a person would have to spend more for another brand just to get this kind of noticeable difference.

LIke I said.. maybe my old tubes were near the end of their life.. that's why they sounded as muddy in the highs and to forward in the mids. As far as I can remember when i got the DAC a few years back.. i don't remember them sounding as horrible as they do now. I'd have to take them and have someone test them for me to know for sure how they test out.

I listened to music for hours on end today.. till i finally had to take a break and eat something.

The highs appeared on some music to be a tad bright for me... so I switched out interconnects from the pre to the amp. and that helped tame them back to a better level. Bass on these are very good I'd have to say.

The thing that still amazes me with these new tubes is the soundstage is back up again on the SDA's. Back to where i knew it should be.

Patrick, what speakers are you running on your system? For $30 or so you may want to pick up a pair of these for your Jolida too.

PRC

I have Canton Ergo 900 DC speakers. I started out with RTi8's, RTi10's, and then the Cantons. Here is the web site. Mine are two years old, the new model is the 609 DC. I don't here a lot about them on this forum so information may be harder to find.

Patrick

Alos the Telefunken's are $45.00 each and the TUNG-SOL's are $25.00 each


http://www.canton.de/index.php?pg_id=13,30,ergo609dc

danger boy

fired up the tubes again with the SRS's.. they just get sweeter and more open the more the tubes burn in.. *doing the happy dance! :eek: