$1000.00 Amp. for Klipschorns

[DrWho]

A point that no one has mentioned, and maybe just automatically assumed is how is it going to be determined where the room deficiencies are and what acoustical treatments are going to be applied. Not everyone has high priced spectrum analyzers. If the tests are going to be done with a test cd and an SPL meter, upstream equipment CAN make a difference. If the current electronics have a bright top end and you treat the room accordingly, any future electronics that have a more mellow top end will be further "mellowed" because the room treatments are absorbing more than if the treatments were applied using the latter electronics, same applies in reverse and well as low end and midrange. Now if you are fortunate to have a nice pricey spectrum analyzer with known response curves, sure then the room can be treated and almost anything will sound good in there. Unfortunately this is not a perfect world, so "perfect world" anologies don't always apply.

Jackpod, I think you missed all of my points, but that's ok. A spectrum analyzer is not the correct tool. You need to use something like a TEF that can measure the direct sound and reflected sound independantly of each other. You can then compare tonal balance between the direct and reflected sound and ensure that the tonal balance remains constant - regardless of the timbre of the direct sound. In other words, you only remove boominess or pingyness if it's the result of the room - not the result of the source material. It most certainly doesn't require a perfect world.

[WopOnTour]

Wrench722

Coincidentally, a good friend of mine asked me that exact same question about 3 months ago. His budget was $1000 as well. <?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

Are you considering tubes? Do you need just a power amp or require an integrated design? If a tube based integrated design is what you are looking for I have a suggestion/recommendation in that price range... Cayin

The story...

As I mentioned a few months back he had asked me to assist him in picking out a decent quality tube amp for $1000 to enjoy with his Klipschorns. At the time, he had them driven by an older Sony ES Prologic receiver he had kicking around and they sound pretty damn good (his source is mostly CD and SACD) But he absolutely loves the musicality of my JEL 300DX (and Lascalas) and I've even offered to build him an amp, BUT feels they are just a bit under-powered for his liking (his opinion not mine) so he wanted something with just a bit more punch but still with that beautifully warm tube tone. (He listens to a lot of C&W, jazz & blues)

Anyways, after searching the Internet and going back and forth with dozens of emails, it was clear there is currently JUST A TON of low cost (<$1000) no-name and off-brand tube amplifiers flooding the NA market these days- mostly out of Hong Kong and Taiwan. Of course after spending the better part of 3 years building, rebuilding, upgrading and tweaking about a dozen reiterations of my own SET- I was somewhat skeptical of the component selection and build quality one might expect out of such low priced units. Since he wasn't really willing to just risk it and purchase one of these off-brands on eBay or on-line without a hearing them first, we called a few local audio stores to see if anyone was stocking anything similar. To my surprise many did. Eventually one Saturday we both headed out to a couple of more obscure local audio shops downtown in order to check out a number of lower cost China sourced offerings including XIANG,Dared,DIY HIFI, and Cayin.

Well we BOTH ended up buying Cayin amps! LOL

He eventually settled on the Cayin A-50T ($999) which I can tell you that even with the "no name" Chinese (or Russian?) tube compliment (2x12AX7,2x12AU7, 4xEL-34) sounds absolutely fantastic on his K-horns! (and getting better every day) It's a push-pull AB1 amp that peaks out at 2x16W (triode mode) which IMO is more than enough power with Khorns for typical listening room levels BUT just in case you are entertaining or throwing a party (or have a larger room as he has) it also has a really neat feature allowing you to double the power and switch to 2x35watts connecting the EL-34s in ultra-linear mode-which with K-horns is guaranteed to wake the neighbors! He's connected to the 8ohm posts and it still sounds excellent (albeit painful) @ max volume I might add with very little if any distortion.

Before we bought, the proprietor at the shop was even kind enough to let us remove the bottom (and side) plate covers to check out the internal componentry. I was initially less than enthused by obvious "clones" of brand-name capacitors (REALcaps? and what the @#%^ is SWELLONG??) These were quite obviously designed to look very similar to RELcaps and Hovlands but just HOW would they PERFORM? .There were a few recognizable name-brand components as well (ALPS volume controls, Nichicon and Rubicon electrolytics, WBT RCA jacks and speaker binding posts, and some very decent looking "no-name" toriodal (power supply) and EI (output) trannies. But the construction, point to point layout and build quality appeared top-notch I must say. It even has a remote control. After about an hour listening to various CDs and LPs he was sold (and I was as well- lol)

About the only suggested improvement might be to swap in some matched NOS valves for these "no name" (Cayin branded)units especially if you don't have the patience to burn them in for a few 100 hours in order to soften them up a bit. But even right out of the box I don't find these EL34s as glaringly bright as I have with many other newer Chinese and Russian tubes.

Myself, I absolutely fell in love with the Cayin HA-1A headphone amp after only 5-10 minutes previewing it with a pair of decent (SR225) Grado cans. (I have RS-2s) It's based on a pair of EL-84s which is a tube very near and dear to my heart as I had more than a few old Harmon Kardon and Fisher amps back in the 70s based on that drippy sweet valve.It too is switchable between triode and ultra-linear modes albeit to only a maximum 2x2.4watts. However, it can also be used as a pre-amp and even has 8-ohm speaker outputs! (It still sounds extremely good on my Lascalas but clearly not enough power IMO) I also loved the fact that the HA-1 has selectable headphone impedance from 6-300ohms as I actually have quite few sets that vary greatly in load. So I ended up buying his demo unit for $650.

Although I had never really heard of Cayin until 3 months ago, (I've since learned they've been around a few years) about all I can say I am impressed with their entire line up features-wise and VERY impressed with the sound quality given the price point. I'd sure like to hear how Cayin's more expensive KT-88 and 6550 amps sound. I had an HK Citation 2 back in the early 80s that I sincerely miss, but maybe the Cayin A88T or A100T might be a fitting "modern" alternative?

Does anyone here have one or maybe heard this amp perform?

Anyways , there's not much info on Cayin available on the web but you can check them out here:

http://www.sparkaudio.com/indexe.asp

http://www.vasaudio.com/

There's also a few favorable reviews, specs and much better pics on Acoustic Sounds (good people)

http://store.acousticsounds.com/browse_detail.cfm?Title_ID=16537&section=

http://store.acousticsounds.com/browse_detail.cfm?Title_ID=17073&section=equipment

Just thought I would share and Good Luck on your search

WopOnTour

[jackpod]

A point that no one has mentioned, and maybe just automatically assumed is how is it going to be determined where the room deficiencies are and what acoustical treatments are going to be applied. Not everyone has high priced spectrum analyzers. If the tests are going to be done with a test cd and an SPL meter, upstream equipment CAN make a difference. If the current electronics have a bright top end and you treat the room accordingly, any future electronics that have a more mellow top end will be further "mellowed" because the room treatments are absorbing more than if the treatments were applied using the latter electronics, same applies in reverse and well as low end and midrange. Now if you are fortunate to have a nice pricey spectrum analyzer with known response curves, sure then the room can be treated and almost anything will sound good in there. Unfortunately this is not a perfect world, so "perfect world" anologies don't always apply.

Jackpod, I think you missed all of my points, but that's ok. A spectrum analyzer is not the correct tool. You need to use something like a TEF that can measure the direct sound and reflected sound independantly of each other. You can then compare tonal balance between the direct and reflected sound and ensure that the tonal balance remains constant - regardless of the timbre of the direct sound. In other words, you only remove boominess or pingyness if it's the result of the room - not the result of the source material. It most certainly doesn't require a perfect world.

Dr. Who, Maybe today with such tools available as a TEF, which is a new technology and was not available just a few years ago. Spectrum analyzers and pink noise (not source material) were used for many years. Used properly and having the experience to know what to do with the results a simple spl meter and oscillator can also be used to tune a room.

[DrWho]

http://www.prosoundweb.com/studyhall/lastudyhall/eq.php

[NOSValves]

WopOnTour,

If your adventurous with a soldering Iron and you can snap me some under chassis shots of those Cayin's I can guide you and your friend to even sweater sound out of those babies. This slight mod that would be easily reversible and if careful done would be totally un-noticable if warranty problems cropped up from other unrelated problems. You would just have to heat a few solder joints to take this item off. The HF will become noticeaby smoother and more pleasing from this cheap and easy mod. Especially at higher listening levels! All the Cayins and Prologue line of amps use the same Output Transformers as far as I know and all suffer from this same small problem.

If your interest email me some good clean pictures to make it easier for me to advise over the phone. craigostby@comcast.net

Craig

[Wrench722]

I would like to see some pictures of the underside. [8-|]

[WopOnTour]

Sounds great! THANKS CRAIG!

I'm quite "adventurous" when it comes to the ol' soldering irons actually

Not exactly sure what you are proposing to do at the output trannies (upgrade that weak ceramic bypass cap across that swamping reisistor mounted directly on the transformers perhaps?)

But here's a pic of the A-50T guts. (sorry for the size)

My plan was just to perhaps upgrade some of the caps and maybe the resistors (Kiwames or perhaps Rikens?) in the low level signal path.

WOT

[NOSValves]

WopOnTour,

Okay here you go, Below you will find your very same picture and if you look in the general area of the upper right and left hand corners you will see the white arrows I placed in the photo. These arrows is pointing to the feedback resistor and bypass caps mounted on two terminals on the output transformer (yes these look to be indentical to the old Cayin TA-30 just as I suspected). The Cayin transformer has some nastiness in the HF response like most budget Chinese amps but still much less then the amps you see for $400 on eBay! The Cayin has decent Iron considering its price range.

The very simple little mod is to pick up some Mica caps in varying values from 50pf to about 125pf (buy all the value in this range in about 10 pf increments that are available from whatever source you prefer). That is if you really like playing and have an ear that can pickup difference in HF response and smoothness. I would start out with tacking on about 100pf across the existing resistor and cap (parallel of the existing cap and resistor) once done you should hear the much smoother HF. If it seems like you have lost extension it means you have went to far and to back this value down. If it seams like it did wonders you have no evidence of Extension loss then up the value. You may find it needs much more then even 125pF to your ear. If you don't want to play try the 100pF and if you like what you here just forget the playing it should be pretty darn close to optimum for horn speakers. Horns are very pesky to disturbances in the HF. The signal enters with ringing and them horns just let it shine through in spades.

Now if you really want to dive in you can remove the resistor and the cap carefully and measure the value of the resistor. If you decide to go this far report back the value of this resistor and I will take you further into lowering and raising the actual negative feedback. Heck we could even mod the amp for adjustable feedback on the exterior mounted control if you like. Ideally it would be much better to perform all this with a funtion generator and a scope but this mod is a safe bet since I owned a Cayin and did extensive testing and modifictions to one myself.

Enjoy and let me know if you have more questions if for some reason you don't get a reply here send me a email to remind me to revisit this thread.

Craig

[jackpod]

http://www.prosoundweb.com/studyhall/lastudyhall/eq.php

Dr. Who, I am not going to get into this with you. I never said anything about an equalizer. Just because you happen to be a master at search engines and obviously read a tremedous amount does not make up for the many years of experience that some of us do have. So you go on ahead and believe what you read and believe that all practices and procedures prior to the last couple of years didn't work. I wonder then why so many of us prefer technology and designs some 50 years old. Have a nice day!

[NOSValves]

Dr. Who, I am not going to get into this with you. I never said anything about an equalizer. Just because you happen to be a master at search engines and obviously read a tremedous amount does not make up for the many years of experience that some of us do have. So you go on ahead and believe what you read and believe that all practices and procedures prior to the last couple of years didn't work. I wonder then why so many of us prefer technology and designs some 50 years old. Have a nice day!

Jackpod,

Your name is almost correct!! I think you made a typo when you originally picked your forum handle. This post of yours hit the Jack Pot for sure.

Craig

[Wrench722]

Hay NOSValves what do you think about the Cayin A-50T? Do you think it would have the power I am looking for? It looks like I can get one for around $1200.00.[]

[DrWho]

http://www.prosoundweb.com/studyhall/lastudyhall/eq.php

Dr. Who, I am not going to get into this with you. I never said

anything about an equalizer. Just because you happen to be a master at

search engines and obviously read a tremedous amount does not make up

for the many years of experience that some of us do have. So you go on

ahead and believe what you read and believe that all practices and

procedures prior to the last couple of years didn't work. I wonder then

why so many of us prefer technology and designs some 50 years old. Have

a nice day!

Master of the search engine? Why thank you []

Who said anything about EQ? You're the one claiming an RTA can

be used for measuring room acoustics! That's as absurd as trying to

measure the voltage of a wall outlet with a butter knife. Did you actually read the article? For what it's

worth, the practices and procedures so wildly performed in the 80's DID

NOT work. I've been undoing the catastrophic effects on more systems

than I care to name. I most sincerely apologize for posting an article

that I felt echoed so well the last 14 years of my experience...But

alas, nobody need trust my opinion on the matter - why not seek the

leaders of audio research?

http://www.synaudcon.com/site/home.php

Of course, before anyone go bellitle this wonderful organization, allow

me to point out that PWK was an active member, not to mention Don Davis

who was at one time the Vice President for Klipsch...All of audio's

greatest have at some point in time been involved with the research

going on there (even the illustrious Dr. Bose!).

Alas, if 50 year old technology sounds better to your golden

ears, then allow me to encourage you to continue pursuing that sound. [+o(] Far be it for there to be improvements in sound quality.

[jackpod]

Thats the funniest thing I have heard in years. I see you have taken your birthday off of your profile, but if memory serves me correctly you are like 22 years old. How can you make a statement that you have 14 years experience? So you started in the trade at 8 years old?, I am laughing so hard I might have a coronary. I am 55 years old, I played music professionally for 20 years as well as did pro sound for many big name bands in the San Francisco Area, owned my own studio in the 70's, bought my first McIntosh in 1969 (which I still have in absolutely mint condition). I am probably older than your parents. Now lets see if I said I started when I was 15 (which is when I formed my first band), that is still twice your age in my experience. So I guess I will compare the ludicracy of your 14 year experience statement and apply that to everything else you have to say...

Thanks for the laugh, I have tears in my eyes

[DrWho]

Ah, you were a musician first - that explains it all.

And what's wrong with starting at the age of 8? You accuse me of having no experience and then mock me for starting at a young age. Good job. Would you like a cookie? It still doesn't change the fact that your experience doesn't jive with the experiences of the best sound engineers in the world. Surely you don't claim to be better []

Wether or not I have 14 or 80 years experience really isn't going to change anything. I could get a dozens of board operators in here with far more experience and better track records than yourself, but you'll still disagree with them. Continue living on in your fantasy world.

[jackpod]

If you only had a clue, maybe in another 20 years. I hope you had fun insulting all the members here who like 50 year old technology, and insulting all the great audio pioneers who didn't have computerized analysis tools or the Internet to get their info from. I never claimed to be better than anyone, just that I do have a lot of experience and since you did not expereince audio of the 60's, or 70's or 80's and a good part of the 90's I really don't think you have much to stand on.

Have a nice day Mike, I hope you continue to enjoy trying to baffle the people here with bullshit

[WopOnTour]

Yea, I took my first ride in an car at the tender age of 4 days.

I guess that means I have 46 years and 322 days of "automotive experience" ? [8-)]

Can I put that on my resume? []

WopOnTour

[DrWho]

Ah yes, I'm insulting all of the pioneers of audio when I say modern technology provides better sound quality. I guess I'm insuling Mr. Ford when I say his early Model T's aren't the best cars in the world either. I prefer to live in the present, not the past. I don't have to experience the music of the 60s - 80s to know what the live music of today sounds like. Nor do I need vast amounts of experience with archaic tools to know how the new tools work either. Do I need 30 years experience using a stone for a hammer before I can claim the modern hammer is far superior? I don't think so. If you want to continue using your stone, then I hope you enjoy yourself.

[NOSValves]

Hay NOSValves what do you think about the Cayin A-50T? Do you think it would have the power I am looking for? It looks like I can get one for around $1200.00.[]

Wrench,

well when it comes to off shore gear I'm on the cheap side and think if you buy it that it should be a great deal like these exact amps were before the heavy marketing companies and approaches got their greedy hands on them. The original version were sold new for about $700 with upgrades from the first USA dealer. Then they were a great deal.

So here is what I suggest to you

Stop take a deap breath and try to find any "Cayin or Prologue" 30 to 40 watt amplifier (max) on the used market that strikes your fancy they are all basically the same except some ergonomic features. This way the seller takes that new purchase hit. So if you decide to move on up the ladder like most folks do in this hobby you can flip it for little loss or you could even afford to have it upgraded in various sections with the $ saved doing the work yourself or even having a pro do it, Many little fine tuning things exist in those circuits!

.

But if a few hundred lost is no big deal to you. Then by all means go for it new!!

Craig

[PrestonTom]

Gentlemen,

WRENCH had a legitimate question about matching an amp to use with Klipschorns. It is an interesting topic and one that many of us are curious about. I certainly do not thave the money and energy to sample 3 dozen different amps to figure out which is the best value. I am open to hearing about the success & failures that others have had. I find that helpful.

Perhaps you can bury the hatchet...

-Tom

[NOSValves]

If you only had a clue, maybe in another 20 years. I hope you had fun insulting all the members here who like 50 year old technology, and insulting all the great audio pioneers who didn't have computerized analysis tools or the Internet to get their info from. I never claimed to be better than anyone, just that I do have a lot of experience and since you did not expereince audio of the 60's, or 70's or 80's and a good part of the 90's I really don't think you have much to stand on.

Have a nice day Mike, I hope you continue to enjoy trying to baffle the people here with bullshit

Jackpod,

A piece of advise...... many have traveled the road your now on. All have been lost in the endless round-abouts. Take the path with the quickest striaght path to you destination. Now if I could only learn to take this advise myself []

Craig