Thanks to everybody who came. It is nice to have so many new friends because of this hobby. Thanks for the donations for the chow.
Brandon (Hantra), Sol, and I survived to the end, which went to almost 11! A nice long party, great for me since I don't have to drive home! Thanks for staying late guys, it was fun. The ending system was the Quads with Snappers, Cary SLP-05 (SLP=Sweet Little Preamp, sweet yes, little no), SB3>Altmann DAC with RCA brand digicable, GroverS graphite ICs from DAC to pre, pro audio, balanced, quad shield mic cables from pre to Snappers, JPS SC3 speaker cable, Black Sands power cables, all stock tubes. Equitech provided balanced power sourced from a shared 15A circuit via Black Sands STatement PC, with Silver Ref 5's branching out to the hungry appliances. The Mac C220 used GroverS graphites in and out. The MC402 didn't seem to care whether SE or balanced inputs, but the preamps did, the Cary like Balanced out and the Mac liked SE.
I felt that the Snappers provided more detail in the spatial area. But Shane thought the Mac was tonaly more detailed. It is more in control, more assured, "quieter" peaceful and confident even on raucous music and if you listen for any detail, it is always there. So he may be right. The Snappers seem to breath more life in the the music, are not as "quiet", they are definitely there, but we couldn't identify any specific audiophile characteristic by which they are offending. Brandon suggested the sibilants are a little too "SS'y" sometimes. Those same frequencies are the same by which the Snapper shocks and awes on the high notes of organ music. I wanna understand what you guys mean by "rounded."
I thought the Snappers sounded "louder," and had more bass than the Mac on first comparison, but we didn't switch back to double check. People mentioned to me that they liked the Snappers after we swapped them in after the Mac. I don't think they are the ultimate, but they do tubey things, are pretty powerful and their problems are small considering the price. For the kind of music I like, blue note hard bop, classical choral, organ, symphonic, chamber and solo they give the tonal and spatial details that satisfy me, without too much "excitement" factor to distract. But there is a little bit of excitement factor that is not present in higher caliber amps like AR. I will have a chance to here another EL34 100W tube amp on the Quads soon, Music Reference RM-9, recently restored and tubed by Roger Mojeski. That should be fun to see if it is as present, but tamer. The RM-200 is around the same price as Snappers but KT88s tubes are more my cup of tea.
We listened to the Korato on the Quads, with the Mac C220 preamp which sounds better than Cary on SE output, still with RCA tubes, groverS graphite ICs, balanced Equitech power, with Black Sands Silver Ref 5. It was improved since last time, a little more body, and quieter, darker background. Playing on the quads with 79dB sensitivity the tone still gets a little shrill on dynamic peaks which demand more power. Playing it on my far easier load and more veiled Legacys I thought it sounded OK, the improvement was obvious to me and Sol who have been working on it and noting the gradual improvements in before and after comparisons, but still not what we had hoped. I'm sending it back to Bryan so he can see about further investigation by someone intimately familiar with the DNA. It never reached the smooth satisfying powerful sound that I heard it make at RMAF with ACI Sapphire XL, so I can only think that there is still an errant part in there or something. I really look forward to hearing it again in good health at BSP Audio's next show exhibit. Thanks for the loaner Bryan! Sorry it was such a weird ordeal. But you got our honesty and best effort!
EDIT: We finally figured out why it sounded harsh at both meets, goto this post:http://www.audionervosa.com/index.php?topic=950.msg9457#msg9457The Cary was fun. It allowed more detail to come through beyond what I am used to with the minimax. It was more delicate, more dynamic, had deeper bass, although the bass was not as tight and controlled. The overall tone was noticably richer than minimax with my current tube selection which is pretty balanced and clear. We did not do an AB comparison on the minimax and the Cary. Actually we only listened to the minimax at the beginning of the meet before the Cary took over for direct comparison to Carls C220. Later in the evening Brandon played some really great recordings from his USB drive, pugged into the back of the the ReadyNAS. One, and organ recording, on Dorian record label, was very well recorded, with minimal distortion from huge marble walls typical of organ music. The tonal detail was stunning, the dynamics and power of the low end were intoxicating. With the Cary preamp, the bass region really came alive to allow full appreciation of this recording. It also made me realize, once again, that when you upgrade one part to state of the art quality, you will not get maximum potential until all the other supporting components come up to that level also. That was really obvious with the Ushers, which demanded the best. The Quads are a little more forgiving in some ways, they don't need as much power, but are just as sensitive to EQ and noise isues coming from upstream. The Cary also reminded me of how great the Snappers play in balanced mode. They are a fully balanced tube amp, so the single ended input is conjured. I need to go balanced upstream. The last time the system sounded this good was when Stereofool brought his AR Ref 1, with Grover white balanced ICs, and playing miklorsmith's Altmann DAC. That meet inspired me to upgrade SCs, ICs, PCs and source, which are now done, along with a good preamp. But this little reminder about how great the snappers are in balanced is a great inspiration to kick it up a notch.
Some midrange nasties were noticeable in the room, but the bass was well behaved, for the most part, with no room treatment at all. It would probably be a lot better with.... next time - after I decide where the Quads will go. I am trying them upstairs in a smaller room next.
Sol Samet bought 2 of his amps. The I-30 has been a favorite at the meets. This time a recent cap upgrade was a step backward. His I-60 had new output devices and associated circuit tweeks to allow them. I thought it was a big improvement. It was swapped in right after a blissfully inspiring extended listen to Cary>Snapper and it was not hard to switch at all. Sol had designed an experiment that he tried on Brandon and I. We listened to it for a couple minutes, then Sol snipped a couple of grounding wires in some part of the circuit and we compared. It was a nice improvement. This result confirmed an idea Sol has about something about inductance on the emitter blablablaijustnodpretendingnottofeeldumb. His original prototype of this amp circuit is a blob ratsnext of parts soldered together in midair, with output transistors screwed down to a huge heatsink. Strictly for testing on the bench and crude listening. For the finished I-60, some compromises for layout were needed, one of which lengthened a lead 5 times longer than on the blob prototype. Sol now plans to redo the boards in the amp to shorten this ground wire and make the improvement even better than after the 'snip' Reading about how important circuit layout is to an amp's sound is academic until you here what it can really do. Thanks Sol!
Thanks to everyone who came and especially to those who lugged over gear.
Rich