Mundorf capacitors difference

[Salas]

I have use all 3 Mundorf caps you you initially mentioned. I checked them out in a 3 way system with an Eton 3/4 silk dome tweeter. I tested them in place of the tweeter series cap (sole one). M-Cap Supreme was the best. The silver / gold were pleasurable but lacking snap. To some they may sound alluring with added stuff like space, sweetness, analysis. But the most real was M-Cap Supreme. Nice one since its the least expensive.
I do agree with the members that say put your money into drivers and be sure of excellent filter design. First things first.
But if all is well done, yes a great cap opens up a speaker unmistakably.

[dre73]

don`t forget the audyn cap+,the are realy good en less expensive than the mundorf supreme`s.
http://www.audyn.com/pdf/condensator.pdf

[Bgt]

dre73,
where to buy these?

[dre73]

you have p.m.

[Willitwork]

Originally posted by tktran
Joking aside, there are pictures floating about on the web of crossovers from megabuck speakers like Dynaudio's Evidence containing Solen and B&W's new 800D series containing Mundorf MCap Supreme capacitors.

I figure that when even cost-no-object commercial speakers use Solen caps then Solen caps are good enough for me. However if I'm building a crossover that will actually be seen by other people than myself I still stick with Solen, but I sprinkle a few fist-sized, 1000-volt 0.047µF units in the circuit as attention grabbers. If I have no use for a 0.047µF cap in my design I simply install it in some esoteric compensation parallel circuit that has absolutely no effect on the audible frequency range, at least not for humans.

[Gonzalo]

Howdy gang, I am new at thsi forum but was tempted to answer tis one old thread. so here it goes.

If you are the type of person that sustains that interconnect cables have no effect on sound or even that power cords have no effect on how a component sounds then you will probably sustain the same about a capacitos as well, it's only logical.

Let me tell you, I am an engineer specialized in Audio design, yes have designed a couple of small studios and more than a few night club sound stage, dance floor sound and a few theaters and amphitheaters in my time didn't make much moeny but i have it under my belt mostly overseas in Latin America.
Now I work as a sales engineer for my own company and promote CATV and MMDs wireless digital services, video, internet etc. so as you see music doesn not pay the bills for me. but I have turned Audiophile and my years of trial and investigation have thought me a few things, most commercialy available speakers sound good or decent to majority of people so that's what they give you, only a few companies really strive to give you that extra spatial cue, or extra ounce of detail, etc. those of course are made by smaller companies by people who love and passion for music and the reproduction threof means a whole lot.

For those people, we need to divie on 2 distinct groups, 1 self dilluting snake oil salesman vodoo magic sound better because I say so (kind 'a guy) and teh otehr group, a sincere bunch of struggling to achieve meticulously demanding people who really love what tghey do beyond the call of duty, there we have the Nelson Pass, the David Belles, the John Curls of these world who have clearly made it but also the other unknown bunch and the list is really . . . really long.

To give you a clear example the Meadowlarks speakrs now out of business (unfortunately) teh Spicas of the 1970's also extinct, just to name a couple.

Going back to the capacitors, the claim to fame of some manufatcurers of real high end audio equipment, Threshold, Audio Research, Etc. have founded their equipment bases around the sound of a particular character, set of qualities that were more rounded and perfected by their clear choices of capacitors.

Yes I realize that Dynaudio evidently finds their speakers better served by an inexpensive capacitor, that is a decicion that a designer needs to make when they bring a product into production and final design adjustments, mind you these people don't know if you're going to listen to their design speakers with a 600 watt FPB Krell or a monster Mark Levinson No. 33 or if you're sinmply will listen with a 2A3 tube based amplifier single ended with 2 watts per channel, evidently by making the speaker with an efficiency rating of 87dB/Watt/Meter and making teh speaker at 4 ohms (hello!! it's really reading 84 dB then!!) completely rules out the use of a low power triode tube, but when you have a speaker that operated in the 94dB to 99dB W/Meter and then you know you'll hear everything that amplifier puts out, and you'll only hear the first watt of that amp (most likely) you try to make it as transparent and faithful and musical as you possibly can, then your choice of caps becomes critical it could go from harsh to silky smooth and back with the rigt or wrong coice of capacitors.

Everything depends on your snese of hearing and personal tastes.

SO my friend if you can't hear the difference between a Radio Shack $5 interconnect and a $2,000 Kimber KS2130 just to name something good and pricey; then you will be perfectly happy with a $0.35 capacitor that sounds good to you, but then thet defeats the purpose of making your own gear too right?I don't know . . .

I guess you invest a little money, alittle time get results you're happy with and that's what life is all about.

Enjoy the hobby keep posting the good stuff.

Thanks for participating.

[rabbitz]

The standard Mundorf M-Caps (the white suckers) work very well, economical and even though I have tried the Supremes which did show some benefits, I'd rather spend the extra money on better drivers as the return was greater.

[L700]

actually not all speaker can use the same cap but for Mundorf they do all rounded like i try before i use Hovland for Scanspeak Ring Radiator tweeter they sound sweet , detail and airy .... but i try Hovland at vifa XT25 they sound harsh and annoying (both crossover point are different)

[Gonzalo]

OK Gang my buddy wheezer (tinkerer tube gear mod guru extraordinaire), and I have tried, invested time and effort not to mention some $$ as well to get some capacitors in the coupling stage of an Audible Illusions preamp (L-2 heavily modified by wheezer), first round was Mundorf Audiophile M Cap (WHite body red letters) value was established to be 2.2µV to match input impedance on amplifier, so Mundorf Audiophile Cap sounded very euphoric,a all types of music sounded better than real, supernatural i shold say expect the botom octave very shy and the uppermost top end kinda harsh at times depending on material.
Then came some russian K75 caps, they absolutely sucked in my system though wheezer likes its attributes in his system, in mine they felt like a chore listenning them and burning in for hours of "openng up befor ecritical listening" after two weeks or so. . still sucked!! big time!! ao, no K75's for me here, period!.
then came a super blend of cap made by RTI ElEctronics's Dan Babineau (Mr Running Springs Audio), he manufatcures Caps for a few of the high priced guys. . . he just wouldn't name names, but he was nice enough to donate a pair fo his favorite flavor of 2.2µV for the project, I must confess they were extremely detailed and very very fast sounding caps, nothing wrong with them I would put tem in my top 3 must audition in your system. they did everything right and in teh right proportion no easy task for a Cap, indeed.
Now comes the Mundor SIlver/Gold/Oil Capacitor Ohh Child!! hang on to your hat, here is one ineteresting ride, since they tale opver 200 Hours to fully "open up" we went through different stages, finally settled into a very transparent, very detailed, extremely well balanced (no soptlighting of either female voices of a particular instrument here), it seemed to do everything right, a wonderul Cap indeed not as euphoric sounding in this system as the M-Cap Audiophile but then again completely uncolored and a cap that gets completekly out of the way and lets only music through, very similar to teh sound of the RTI cap but with more of the good things, better defined bass tighter deeper, and more pristine top end with oodles of air and detail up on top.
Silky highs, very well controlled bass, nos as euphoric as the otehr Mundorf (which might serve a lesser system by emphasizing some sections of the audio spectrum.
Defintely the cake was taken by the RTI and the Mundorf Silver/Gold/Oil.

Accoridng to the factory, the new type Silver/Gold/Oils has all of the nice features of the Silver/Oil adn none of the hardness of the SIlver/Gold, a perfect balanced combination, if a little to pricey of a product nevertheless a worthwile contender when going fopr a direct upgrade, invest in good components that's all we can do.

Hope this helps a bit.

Bets regards;

Gonzalo

[Anglo]

Originally posted by Willitwork


I figure that when even cost-no-object commercial speakers use Solen caps then Solen caps are good enough for me. However if I'm building a crossover that will actually be seen by other people than myself I still stick with Solen, but I sprinkle a few fist-sized, 1000-volt 0.047µF units in the circuit as attention grabbers. If I have no use for a 0.047µF cap in my design I simply install it in some esoteric compensation parallel circuit that has absolutely no effect on the audible frequency range, at least not for humans.

Maybe the industry does indeed use Solen caps, but the industry around Montreal also uses inefficient drivers and huge xovers that suck the very life out of the music. Different conversation though, fellow Montrealer!

Back to the caps, as for me, subjectively speaking and without any measurements, I have found in a 1st order xover concerning the tweeter, Mundorf caps are way superior to Solen.

Just my 2 cents.