[mlundy57]

I am curious more than anything else but have you tried the oddwatt in the setup? Is it because you really want to keep the Dodd in your system? I would love to know your thoughts on the oddwatt as I was thinking of possibly looking into their preamp.

It would seem to me that one of your integrateds would be the path of least resistance unless you feel they are not up to the task or are set on including the Dodd.

I would also agree to look for used. Try to have fun! Amps that came to mind would be a First Watt or one of Steve Deckert's amps. The First Watts are over $1k though.

You are so good with projects though, why not consider one of the tubelab amp kits? I think you could come up with something pretty spectacular!

Absolutely. The OddWatt PoddWatt is a very nice little amp. I used to drive these speakers with it. As a matter of fact, except for a few hours on Saturday, folks who stopped by my room at the Lone Star Audio Fest last May were listening to these speakers being driven by the 5wpc PoddWatt. For the few hours I wasn't using the PoddWatt I was using a 20wpc Raven Audio Nighthawk. I felt the sound was a little more solid through the Nighthawk but to compare it to the PoddWatt is not a fair comparison. Within the OddWatt line the Nighthawk would be more appropriately compared to the OddBloc Series 2 which are 15-25wpc monoblocks depending on the tubes used (25wpc with KT88's and NOS 12SL7GT tubes).

The reason I am not using either the OddWatt or the Jolida is that I would like to use the Dodd and see what this system has to offer using a passive buffer rather than an active preamp. Running the passive Dodd through the active preamps of either of my intigrateds would defeat the purpose.

I'm not familiar with tubelab. The OddBlocs would actually fit the bill for me and at $665 each with tubes the price is right. However, OddWatts are also kits, you gotta build 'em and for a bull in a china shop with short stubby fingers, not a lot of fine motor control and poor eyesight (OK so I'm blind as a bat without my glasses) the idea of all those itsy bitsy teeny tiny parts intimidate me.  Speakers I can work with, they have big parts with plenty of room to work.

Just my opinion...
I suppose you could justify doing that if you're buying from Best Buy or a big chain where returns are factored in as the cost of doing business.
But I certainly would not suggest doing this with the guys mentioned so far in this thread; they make and sell small quantities. I'm sure each return hurts, and their policy is assuming the buyer has done his homework and has the intention of keeping the unit. Buying 3 and returning 2 is not cool, IMO.

More elegantly stated but my point exactly. 

Mike

[mlundy57]

Now that theory and compatibility for my needs have been addressed, some of the brands I have seen discussed here and in other threads which have amps that might work for me include OddWatt, Decware, AVA, PirmaLuna, Tube Audio Laband Raven. Any others I missed?

Of these I only have personal experience with OddWatt and Raven but it has been almost a year and a half since I heard the OddWatt monoblocks and I don’t remember much about their sound.

Any comments, concerns, comparisons including older models I might find on the used market?

Mike

[mlundy57]

Just bought a used PrimaLuna Prologue 4 off Audiogon. Will see how that works.

Mike

[Early B.]

Just bought a used PrimaLuna Prologue 4 off Audiogon. Will see how that works.

Great!  I suspect the PrimaLuna will be a couple steps above the amps you have now. I'm interested in hearing what you think of it once you get it.

[undertow]

PrimaLuna amps are excellent, but I had to pull out those garbage Solen caps they come with as much as manufactures tout them as being better than the alternative, they may be, but are crap in electronics sounding "Artificial" if you ask me, and hardly high end accept as a woofer bypass cap in a speaker crossover, and they still only cost 1 to 5 bucks a cap so they are not really refined high end from my experience in performance. Below photos I upgraded them all using Clarity ESA, and Mundorf EVO oil caps if interested. Also, replaced the generic input, and output wiring off the the transformers, and speaker posts with some cheap, but much better Teflon 14 gauge copper wiring.

Beyond that these amps will easily compete, and beat out the mega dollar Audio Research, Rogue, whatever other EL34, KT88, KT120 amps out there. Especially with their Auto-bias setup, and solid point to point quality design. If your not asking any amp to play much below 50 or 60 hz which in this case it looks like your running powered subs, even better.

However, as a warning getting into good tube amps whether its a 5 watt / 300B tube, or 40 to 80 watt KT88 based amps this is much like getting into "Analog". The turntable, Cartridge, and phono stage choices are only the beginning. Then you need a record cleaner, and really good recordings which can be harder to find, justify, and pay for!

Meaning the tubes matter not just the amp design, using the right input, driver, and power tubes will make huge differences in my experience with tube amps, and you can easily spend 200 to 800 per set of power tubes even NEW STOCK not even NOS depending on the amp so be prepared to go thru some growing pains to find exactly what you like when it comes to matching up the tone, and sound your after specifically with PrimaLuna amps because they can pretty much run every tube under the sun accept the DHT types [Direct heated triodes]. I went thru EL34, KT66, KT88, KT77, KT90, 6L6, KT120, 6550 etc... They all work great, but some are going to sound much better with a certain speaker type over another... Open baffle I am not sure which will get the detail, and smooth warmth overall without sounding boring, but EL34 Mullard tubes for 20 bucks each new stock is probably a good place to start.

[Captainhemo]

Just bought a used PrimaLuna Prologue 4 off Audiogon. Will see how that works.

Mike

Congrats Mike, hope you enjoy it  !

jay

[Early B.]

PrimaLuna amps are excellent, but I had to pull out those garbage Solen caps they come with as much as manufactures tout them as being better than the alternative, they may be, but are crap in electronics sounding "Artificial" if you ask me, and hardly high end accept as a woofer bypass cap in a speaker crossover, and they still only cost 1 to 5 bucks a cap so they are not really refined high end from my experience in performance. Below photos I upgraded them all using Clarity ESA, and Mundorf EVO oil caps if interested. Also, replaced the generic input, and output wiring off the the transformers, and speaker posts with some cheap, but much better Teflon 14 gauge copper wiring.

You forgot to describe the sonic improvement (if any) you experienced from changing out the caps.

[undertow]

Kinda figured that was obvious from the explanation, but here it goes! So Solens in this amp were definitely a little more "Pinched" with that artificial hyped sound. Solens sorta amplified frequencies calling more attention to themselves vs. being a more analog / flat / balanced sound. The caps I used here are 10 times better 24 hours a day 365 days out of the year anyway so not much to prove accept they just sound better. Control, background depth, flow are just much more realistic without hyping the frequency extremes calling attention to their shortfalls.

As for why these specific caps were used in this design? Well about 100 factors come into play. First in this case would be space, and cost. Then voltage they can take. Truth is the Mundorf EVO caps, and Clarity ESA's are great value, and I put them into the top 2 tiers of any cap I have used. I have had Duelund VSF, and Mundorf Silver/Gold/Oil as well [No I never used Duelund Cast Caps and no intentions to].

Honestly depending on the application none of these were "Better". Some are better depending on where you use them from experience. Plus if you want to use something like Clarity MR top of the line, or Mundorf top of the line, or V-Caps, Duelund etc... The size and cost is WAY beyond what can be used in most tube amps not to mention most are not made in values much above a few uF, this amp needed 10 uF alone so that eliminates a couple of them from use because they don't even make them in their normal lines.

My favorite caps even over the Duelund, V-caps, and Mundorfs are actually Audyn True Copper caps, and Obbligato Gold caps. However, Audyn True coppers don't come in the values, or physical sizes needed for this amp, and the Obbligato Golds are simply too heavy to hang off the leads like the larger Mundorf EVO's you see in the photos or the original lightweight Solens. The EVO's are very light weight, and honestly are probably within 5% of the overall sound quality you will obtain from any other good cap in this amp. Arguably they are an oil cap, and some say over time may dry out, but the heat is very limited to zero in the bottom of this amp so not too concerned. I have used AmpOhm as well, not bad caps, harder to get, and again pretty sure you won't find physical sizes to work in this amp or many others for that matter.

The Clarity's and EVO's used in here are VERY large as well, especially the Clarity's in that application as you can see will barely fit on the board, no other cap physically with the cost and sound will fit easily at all. But that's okay because after many years using a lot of different caps I totally trust they are getting 98% the performance any other good cap will in the application overall. The Solens sound 60% as good.

By the way this upgrade DIY cost me less than 40 bucks with all the caps, well worth it over the Solens no question, and you don't need to spend 100's or thousands to get top tier sounding caps! In the end you can argue now it sounds more like a "Musical Tube amp" the romantic, and smoother clich'e vs. more Solid State with the Solens...

[Poultrygeist]

I drive my open baffle wide banders with the Bottlehead 2a3 SET amps.

I had a Prologue One for a few weeks and liked it's power but it lacked the resolution I was looking for.