Cary SLP-05 balanced or single ended


I purchased a Cary preamp and read in Stereophile that the performance in balanced mode suffered compared to to unbalanced mode. Of course this leads me to look for RCA type interconnects. I'm a DIY guy to a point and was looking to build my own, rather than shell out large sums of money for brand name interconnects which I'll no little how they sound until they show at my doorstep.

VH-Audio sells some very nice silver wire with a cotton dielectric and low capacitance sleeve. I'm thinking of giving this a go. Any thoughts?

The detail and excitement this tube pre brings is amazing. There is a cost however in that some songs portray highlights a bit over the top. The same goes for vocals where is can get a bit shouty. I tried some brown base Sylvania's yesterday and that cured the upper end aggressiveness but at the expense of some detail and loss of lower end textures in the base/midbass dept. Is there a happy medium for 6SN7 tubes in this regard?

FWIW, I'm fairly new to tube based equipment. I'm hopeful for some insight from some well experienced folks here.
Thanks much!
128x128desalvo55
I run all balanced in my set up: Marantz SA11-S2 SACD to Cary SLP-05 pre to Cary 211 AE monoblocks to Vandy 3A Sigs all connected via Cardas cabling. The sound quality of this set-up is fantastic. I'm using EH 6SL7's - nothing exotic but they sound great to me. You don't tell us what speakers you have (or any other details of your system).
I'm running Nuforce 9SEV2's, source being a Transporter and feeding AV123 LS6 line arrays. Mostly VH-Audio power using Furutech and Oyaide connectors. My interconnects I feel are the weak link (no pun intended).

Krisjan - Did you mean EH 6SN7's?
I run mine fully balanced into a pair of CAD-211 AE monoblocks. The SLP-05 is a fully balanced preamp. Where in Stereophile did it say that the performace suffered? I don't feel that way at all.
From my experiene: high quality simgle ended outperform medium quality balanced transmission....and vice-versa.
Everything being equal and I mean everything including equipment then balanced transmission will give you a bit blacker background and slightly more low level details.

Warm Regards