You are in unusual position - most people complain that dynamic range is TOO SMALL. The bigger difference between quiet and loud sounds - the better.
But this has nothing to do with amplifier. Dynamic range is defined at mastering of the record and is not changed on playback, unless you use compressor or expander.
But this has nothing to do with amplifier. Dynamic range is defined at mastering of the record and is not changed on playback, unless you use compressor or expander.
I too like dynamic range on some music. But my favorite form of music is Opera and what I find is that the orchestra part is too loud relative to the singers voices. As you said this may be due to the recording, but I never noticed it before when I used to have a solid state amp.
It is possible that amplifier clips at loud moments. It will be very unplesant to hear that clipping. Other than that there should be no difference from solid state.
At the same time I wouldn't make any changes (tubes too) without check on test bench with spectrum analyzer.
At the same time I wouldn't make any changes (tubes too) without check on test bench with spectrum analyzer.
''the dynamic range as music goes from soft to loud, is too large''
The amp is doing what it should! Time to listen some music, enjoy!
The amp is doing what it should! Time to listen some music, enjoy!
Hi,
Welcome to the wonderful world of tube amps.
Odd as you may find it, most SS amps sound awfully compressed to me so there you go. To each his poison.
Cheers, 😉
Welcome to the wonderful world of tube amps.
Odd as you may find it, most SS amps sound awfully compressed to me so there you go. To each his poison.
Cheers, 😉
As I am listening to more and more Classical / Opera CDs I see your point about dynamic range. I have some wonderful recordings and they sound wonderful with this tube amp. However, what I also found is that if you have a poorly recorded CD, and I have a few of those, it probably sounds worse on a Tube amp than a Solid State Amp. I was listening to a 1950's recording of Madame Butterfly with Victoria De Los Angeles. With the orchestra volume set as high as I could comfortably listen to it, I could barely hear the soprano's voice. I guess my solid state amp probably compressed it making the sounds closer to each other.
Please don't misunderstand me. I absolutely love the sound of Tube amps and that is why my solid state one is now boxed in the basement. The purpose of my questions is to fine tune the tube amp that I bought to make it sound as good as possible. Replacing the tubes was definitely an improvement, in my opinion. As soon as I have a free afternoon I will be replacing the six 0.22uf capacitors with "AUDYN TRUE COPPER" capacitors. I hope I get some additional improvement in sound as I did by replacing tubes.
Please don't misunderstand me. I absolutely love the sound of Tube amps and that is why my solid state one is now boxed in the basement. The purpose of my questions is to fine tune the tube amp that I bought to make it sound as good as possible. Replacing the tubes was definitely an improvement, in my opinion. As soon as I have a free afternoon I will be replacing the six 0.22uf capacitors with "AUDYN TRUE COPPER" capacitors. I hope I get some additional improvement in sound as I did by replacing tubes.
Amplifiers DO NOT compress anything until they clip. It is possible that tube amp is not powerful enough to reproduce sound of large orchestra. That is why you have to turn volume down. What is your solid state amp and speakers?
My speakers are B&W CM9. My solid state amp is a JVC class A amp the referred to as Digifine. It was made in the 1980s. It's retail price was $1200 although I bought it on a close out sale for half of that. The Yaqin sounds much better than my JVC
This was quite a day with my Yaqin MC-100b. For several weeks I have been planning on taking it apart to install the 6 new coupling capacitors. After taking off the screws on the bottom plate, I next proceeded to unscrew the main board. That was not easy as you have to take off all of the front controls to get the board out. Finally I did that and took off the old .22uf capacitors and installed my upgraded capacitors, which are several times bigger than the old ones. All of this was a huge effort, much more work than I was expecting. But at the end of the day, I got everything done and the amp sounds better than ever. In fact at this point since I have upgraded the caps and all of the tubes, I don't think there is anything else I want to do. I am listening to Chopin now and he has never sounded better.
My observation from working on the inside of the amp is that it is extremely well constructed and with the exception of the coupling caps, the other parts look like they are of reasonably good quality.
Thanks to all of you who offered me guidance in upgrading this amp. I am truly thrilled with it now.
My observation from working on the inside of the amp is that it is extremely well constructed and with the exception of the coupling caps, the other parts look like they are of reasonably good quality.
Thanks to all of you who offered me guidance in upgrading this amp. I am truly thrilled with it now.
Did you replace the caps with the original value or did you put in 1uf's.
Also what were the differences after the new tubes and caps?
Thanks
mdr
Also what were the differences after the new tubes and caps?
Thanks
mdr
Yeah, isn't the True Copper a great cap? 🙂
I replaced the 4 infront of the KT88s with 0,1uF and the other C5/C6 with 0,22uF. I use my mc100 over 180hz (12db) and i have a American Audio VPL-1500 together with a dcx2496 for bass duty.
My kt88 is also Gold Lion! Very happy with them for almost a year now.
The other tubes are JJ ecc83s and russian 6sn7 from 1978.
I replaced the 4 infront of the KT88s with 0,1uF and the other C5/C6 with 0,22uF. I use my mc100 over 180hz (12db) and i have a American Audio VPL-1500 together with a dcx2496 for bass duty.
My kt88 is also Gold Lion! Very happy with them for almost a year now.
The other tubes are JJ ecc83s and russian 6sn7 from 1978.
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Yes, I love the sound of the true copper. As my knowledge of electronics is not as extensive as other members of this forum, I decided to not change any values since I don't understand enough about what impact that would have. So I left the capacitors as 0.22UF.
To answer the question about sound, I replaced my tubes first. The gold lion 12ax7 replacements had a huge impact in my opinion. The amplifier had a very "rough" sound to it, when it arrived. After I replaced the 12ax7s the sound became warmer and fuller. I next replaced the 6sn7s with EH and that also made the sound warmer and fuller, although they did not have as big of an impact as the 12ax7s. Finally I replaced the KT88s with Gold Lions and the sound continued to improve.
After replacing the caps, I noticed a significant improvement in the sound staging. Before I bought this amp, I went to my local Best Buy and listened to a $5000 McIntosh tube amp. I viewed that as the "gold standard". I can't say that my upgraded Yaqin is as good as the McIntosh, but considering that with upgrades I only paid about $1000 for the Yaqin, dollar for dollar, the Yaqin is a much better value than the McIntosh (value meaning quality / price). More importantly I don't need my amp to sound any better than my Yaqin sounds.
Long story short, I am thrilled with my Yaqin now and hope to have many years of listening to classical / opera / popular music on it!
To answer the question about sound, I replaced my tubes first. The gold lion 12ax7 replacements had a huge impact in my opinion. The amplifier had a very "rough" sound to it, when it arrived. After I replaced the 12ax7s the sound became warmer and fuller. I next replaced the 6sn7s with EH and that also made the sound warmer and fuller, although they did not have as big of an impact as the 12ax7s. Finally I replaced the KT88s with Gold Lions and the sound continued to improve.
After replacing the caps, I noticed a significant improvement in the sound staging. Before I bought this amp, I went to my local Best Buy and listened to a $5000 McIntosh tube amp. I viewed that as the "gold standard". I can't say that my upgraded Yaqin is as good as the McIntosh, but considering that with upgrades I only paid about $1000 for the Yaqin, dollar for dollar, the Yaqin is a much better value than the McIntosh (value meaning quality / price). More importantly I don't need my amp to sound any better than my Yaqin sounds.
Long story short, I am thrilled with my Yaqin now and hope to have many years of listening to classical / opera / popular music on it!
Is there a 3X improvement in sound with the Audyn copper caps as compares to the Jantzen Z-superior?
$250 vs $78 US.
thanks
mdr
$250 vs $78 US.
thanks
mdr
Great thanks.
Are there any other replacements that would improve the unit?
I'm looking at replacing the pot with a stepped attenuator.
thanks again
mdr
Are there any other replacements that would improve the unit?
I'm looking at replacing the pot with a stepped attenuator.
thanks again
mdr
I cannot compare the Jantzen to the Copper Caps because I only tried the Copper ones. I would make two points. First, I only paid 150 for the 6 caps, not 250. I bought them from parts express.
Second, cost is not the only factor. Taking apart the MC100B is a major effort. It is very hard to get the main circuit board out to unsolder / solder Caps. I spent about 4 hours on the job. Thus there is the labor to take into consideration. My thought was to just go ahead and buy the best Caps and not worry about the cost compared to Jantzen. In the end I am glad I did. My MC100 sounds fabulous now and I wont take it apart again unless something breaks
Second, cost is not the only factor. Taking apart the MC100B is a major effort. It is very hard to get the main circuit board out to unsolder / solder Caps. I spent about 4 hours on the job. Thus there is the labor to take into consideration. My thought was to just go ahead and buy the best Caps and not worry about the cost compared to Jantzen. In the end I am glad I did. My MC100 sounds fabulous now and I wont take it apart again unless something breaks
Volume pot is not reliable. In mine unit it started making noise in less than a year. Generally I would get better tube and tune circuit before changing brand of components. That will be just iceing on the cake.
Alps, when you say that you changed the volume control is that only because you hear noise when adjusting it, or is there also a problem when it is set at a specific volume?
I have another general question. As I have said before my Yaqin MC100b works great with my CD player and tuner. the lowest volume on my volume control is about at the 7 o'clock position. I usually play music at between the 8 and 9 o'clock position.
This weekend I tried playing a blu-ray opera on through my amp. My blu ray player only has a coaxial digital out and so I hooked up a D/A converter between the blu ray player and the amp. The problem was that the volume was way too low. I had to set the amp volume at 12 O'clock position and I could start to hear some distortion at that level. I tried a different A/D converter that I had, but the problem was basically the same.
My question is: is this a common problem and what do people do to get around it? I have one of those Bravo tube headphone amps. Would it help to use that as a preamp?
Volume pot stated to make scratching sound in speakers while adjusting. For me this is the reason to replace it.
You problem with DAC is likely related to a DAC itself. I used mc100 as power amplifier with sepate preamp. Commonly I set volume all way to the right in Yaqin and use preamp to adjust actual volume. I didn't hear any distortion, but I modified circuit so that it had less gain than original one.
You problem with DAC is likely related to a DAC itself. I used mc100 as power amplifier with sepate preamp. Commonly I set volume all way to the right in Yaqin and use preamp to adjust actual volume. I didn't hear any distortion, but I modified circuit so that it had less gain than original one.
Noisy volume pots are often caused by passing a small DC current through the track-wiper interface. In valve amps this is often grid current. Putting a resistor to ground doesn't help unless there is also a coupling cap.
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