Wow..Thanks for all the responses guys..
First off, Frederik I reversed the absolute polarity at the speaker terminals and though it did recess the soundstage a tad, it was at the expense of a smearing in the mids and a wrong sounding bass. So I reverted back to normal phase..
Grannyring thanks for your input as well..have followed your postings in other threads..much appreciated..Yes meat on the bones is what I'm on about and I believe the Duelunds are very source dependent..so your sources are probably spot on..
This follows on to what Volleyguy was saying about the Duelund caps showing up faults upstream..
Volleyguy firstly with regards to the Ampohms I was very aware of their mid-centric nature so I ended up getting higher value caps of the order of a factor of 4X or 5X..so instead of the .047uf I ended up with .22uf which shifted the sweet spot down into the lower frequencies giving a more balanced sound..I ended up with a more mellow sound with a stronger but alas flabbier base..
So this brings me to the Duelunds. As I mentioned in my opening post I had changed DACs at roughly the same time as I changed to Duelunds. Initially and after break-in, and while I still had the Ampohms in the Almarro, I sensed a reduced soundstage but better frequency extension with the new Minimax DAC..
However once the Duelunds went in the signature of the Minimax DAC became more pronounced..its mechanical nature with sharper attack and greater pace became apparent and the Duelunds presented this in the most honest fashion..
So to give the Duelunds another + different source, and one I was fairly familiar with, I reverted back to the Bel Canto DAC..the tube compliment in the Almarro was also restored to the same set I had listened to over a couple of years with the Ampohm caps (Sylvania EL84 + RCA 7025 black plates), the tube dampers and isolation went back in..everything back to the way it was..
Well guess what? well you don't have to as you probably already know..the 'body' was back. A full-bodied holographic soundstage was there in abundance..
Yes the over-sampling DAC is not the last word in resolution but it portrays emotion, gestalt, tone like few other DACs..
So there you go the Duelunds are the most honest caps I've ever heard..make sure you've got your sources sorted and the CAST will give you that in spades..
Chadeffect you were right about the CAST letting in more character but it wasn't the Amp's but the DAC's..
The Almarro SEP is a great amp in stock form but having such a short signal path it's very amenable to cap rolling and it can be voiced uniquely with a change of caps..
Jon L on Audiocircle and Head-Fi has the same amp and he has rolled and documented more caps than anyone..you can find his excellent thread here;
http://www.audiocircle.com/index.php?topic=54218.0
So I'm back to the OS Bel Canto DAC..don't know if I'm game on Opamp rolling the Minimax.. I have some Burson Discretes waiting to go into it..but I'm going to put that on hold while I get more enjoyment out of the Duelunds, and clear my back-log of new + required listening CDs..
First off, Frederik I reversed the absolute polarity at the speaker terminals and though it did recess the soundstage a tad, it was at the expense of a smearing in the mids and a wrong sounding bass. So I reverted back to normal phase..
Grannyring thanks for your input as well..have followed your postings in other threads..much appreciated..Yes meat on the bones is what I'm on about and I believe the Duelunds are very source dependent..so your sources are probably spot on..
This follows on to what Volleyguy was saying about the Duelund caps showing up faults upstream..
Volleyguy firstly with regards to the Ampohms I was very aware of their mid-centric nature so I ended up getting higher value caps of the order of a factor of 4X or 5X..so instead of the .047uf I ended up with .22uf which shifted the sweet spot down into the lower frequencies giving a more balanced sound..I ended up with a more mellow sound with a stronger but alas flabbier base..
So this brings me to the Duelunds. As I mentioned in my opening post I had changed DACs at roughly the same time as I changed to Duelunds. Initially and after break-in, and while I still had the Ampohms in the Almarro, I sensed a reduced soundstage but better frequency extension with the new Minimax DAC..
However once the Duelunds went in the signature of the Minimax DAC became more pronounced..its mechanical nature with sharper attack and greater pace became apparent and the Duelunds presented this in the most honest fashion..
So to give the Duelunds another + different source, and one I was fairly familiar with, I reverted back to the Bel Canto DAC..the tube compliment in the Almarro was also restored to the same set I had listened to over a couple of years with the Ampohm caps (Sylvania EL84 + RCA 7025 black plates), the tube dampers and isolation went back in..everything back to the way it was..
Well guess what? well you don't have to as you probably already know..the 'body' was back. A full-bodied holographic soundstage was there in abundance..
Yes the over-sampling DAC is not the last word in resolution but it portrays emotion, gestalt, tone like few other DACs..
So there you go the Duelunds are the most honest caps I've ever heard..make sure you've got your sources sorted and the CAST will give you that in spades..
Chadeffect you were right about the CAST letting in more character but it wasn't the Amp's but the DAC's..
The Almarro SEP is a great amp in stock form but having such a short signal path it's very amenable to cap rolling and it can be voiced uniquely with a change of caps..
Jon L on Audiocircle and Head-Fi has the same amp and he has rolled and documented more caps than anyone..you can find his excellent thread here;
http://www.audiocircle.com/index.php?topic=54218.0
So I'm back to the OS Bel Canto DAC..don't know if I'm game on Opamp rolling the Minimax.. I have some Burson Discretes waiting to go into it..but I'm going to put that on hold while I get more enjoyment out of the Duelunds, and clear my back-log of new + required listening CDs..