View Single Post
  #5  
Old 11-25-2014, 02:17 AM
tima tima is offline
Living La Vida Vinyl
 
Join Date: Mar 2010
Posts: 1,398
Default

Quote:
Originally Posted by 2fastdriving View Post
I've often wondered why McIntosh preamps are so popular for tube rolling, while many other brands are generally not experimented with.

I used to own a mcintosh c2300, and I tried different tubes with great results.

But my current pre, the Ref 5, comes to mind. I don't believe I've ever read about a single person putting a different brand of tube in their unit. In fact, I don't even know what brand of 6H30P it has? Are they ARC brand? Is there any benefit of trying another brand?
People who own preamps with rollable tubes - differently manufactured tubes that are electrically the same and available - will experiment. Ask owners of earlier Conrad-Johnson or Atma-Sphere preamps, etc, etc - more folks who can roll tubes do than not. For newer gear, several manufacturers have switched from the 6DJ8 to the 6H30.

Wrt the 6H30, they're all made in the same factory and labeled 6H30П. The normal default version typically has an 'EB' suffix (6H30П-EB). It is the tube you'll find as stock from manufacturers who offer gear using this tube, including ARC, BAT, etc. regardless of branding. The EH gold pins is a gimmick, imo. Fwiw ARC has an excellent implementation of this tube.

There is/was a DR suffixed varietal that was a military version. Ten years ago they could be had for ~$30. Nowadays their prices are very high and provenance typically unknown. The only vendors of DR's I'd trust are Conus audio and Tubestore. Eugene Karna of Conus imported the last of the DRs out of Russia and sold half that lot to Tube Store back in 2005. With current prices and the ease of forgery I wouldn't otherwise bother. The DR does offer some improvement in ARC Reference preamps - I've tried them in the Ref 5, 5SE, Ref Phono 2 and 2SE. Slightly more resolution and some refinement in the top end with a wee bit less grain.

More at this web page from Audiophile Club of Athens.

The last ARC REF linestage to use the 6DJ8-family was the REF 2 and phonostage was the PH-7. If you want to improve the sound of your ARC REF preamps & amps, think vibration isolation, signal and power cords. To have fun rolling tubes, look for gear that uses 6DJ8 family, 6SN7s, 12AX7s, etc.
Reply With Quote