Where to go from here? upping the tube ante

Budrew, if those are the "Mullards" that are mil-spec in white boxes marked as CV4004 KQDD/K that is part of your problem. These tubes are CRAP from the 1980's, that do not have the same wonderful sonics as real NOS Mullards from the 1970's and earlier. Look at the tubes; you won't see the Mullard name printed on the glass. I would try to find a pair of real NOS Mullards. Andy at Vintage Tube Services might be able to help. Tel # is: 616-454-3467.

Fatparrot, looks like you're right. They are white-box CV4004 Mullards! Looks like I still have a lot to learn about what is really what in the tube world. However, they are better than what came with the C2200 originally.

For the record, I never said I was unhappy with my set up, just curious about where one can go from here. An idle yet dangerous question.

I knew someone would throw in a turntable somewhere! They always do. I don't have any LPs nor do I want to unnecessarily complicate my software inventory. But, I did just inhert all of my grandfathers LPs : 0 Still not going there just yet though.

Budrew, sorry to hit a sore spot with the turntable comment. The reason I looked at this thread was because of your amp & pre which I really admire. I just felt that the McIntosh stuff is so good that the most reasonable way to get more of what you asked about was with the front end, be it Lp's or maybe SACD's. Anyway good luck with your tube rolling and enjoy your great system.

Bid63, No sore spot at all : ) Please, all thoughts welcome. The Mcintosh is great and I doubt that I will do anything new in that department, at least for a long time. They seem to be sleepers; people are quick to shrug off Mcintosh. But, as I learn more about component designs I just get curious about how things compare.

I've actually begun to look into turntables since I'll have so many from my grandfather. Thought I might get a decent Rega as a simple answer for now. Someday anyway. My grandfather also had a Tandberg reel-to-reel with lots of tapes. Could be fun to explore.

Budrew, I use the same Mullard 12AX7's (CV4004) and the 12AT7's from Upscale in my Mac and they are leagues better than the original tubes. That said, this vintage (80's) Mullard isn't supposed to be the best available.

I plan to try to find something better.

Now.. for the real deal. GEC KT88's will make your amp much more natural sounding. I was blown away when I discovered that having a pair of GEC KT88's in there along side the rest of the Svetlana KT88's made a monumental improvement in tonality and listenability. I since purchaed 6 more GEC's but discovered that the amp sounds best with Two Svetlana's and six GEC's. Running with all eight GEC's was too much of a good thing... Having a single Svetlana on each channel opened up the midrange without losing the splendor of the GEC. Nice.

I'd suggest you give the GEC's a try. The MC2102 is softer sounding than the MC2000 and as a result, may require less GEC's to get the same result.

Recently a friend of mine took this advice and inserted two GEC KT88's in his Conrad Johnson P8 amps - (which hold 16 KT88's). The improvement made by having only two GEC's in his amp was even more substantial than what I had in the Mac.