Tube dampeners on ARC gear ... FREE TWEAK


Here's a cheap (free) tweak for owners of ARC gear using the black tube dampeners. If you move both dampeners as far up toward the top of the tube as possible without having the top one fall off, taking care that both dampeners are solidly touching each other, you will get better dynamics, bass, mids, highs and a lower noise floor. Try it ... you'll like it.
128x128oregonpapa
^^^

bdb24 ...

My friend Warren and I took advantage of those Harmonia Mundi parking lot sales many times.  Their location was about 45 minutes from my place going south down the coast highway. If I remember correctly, they sold the LP's for five buck apiece. No CD's of course because they didn't exist at that time.  As a result, I have a lot of HM Vinyl.

Then, years later, I happened to stop by a record store in Burbank just on a whim.  Someone had traded in a ton of HM CD's a couple of days before I got there. They were asking $2.99 each. I was pretty flush at the time, so I bought almost all of them.  There were a few dogs in the bunch, so I traded them in and kept the rest. I still have them in the collection. 

I actually had a Harmonia Mundi listening session last night. It was all CD's as I didn't feel like changing records. The debate wore me out. *lol*.

The new Herbie's tube dampeners are so effective that every HM CD I played took on a new lease on life. Quite amazing actually considering that I only changed out the dampeners on the five tubes in the preamp.

I'm getting so much more inner detail and textural overtones from instruments now ... and that's without subtracting anything except distortion.  The improved detail isn't etched or bright in any way, just more musical and closer to real. 

When I get around to replacing the dampeners in the CD player, that's six more. What's that going to do? Zowie!

Prior to getting into the SR Black fuses, the SR HFT's, and now the Herbie's tube dampeners over the past year, I only listened to CD's as a convenience. With these tweaks in place, I've found that I'm listening to CD's probably 80% of the time now. So many of the red-book CD's have magic in those bits. Its a lot like going from an entry level cartridge, say like a $49 dollar Grado, to one of the better Audio Technica cartridges and then discovering how much information is hidden deep inside those grooves on Mono records. A revelation, really

Frank
bdb24 ...

Before I went to bed last night, I scored this on Ebay:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/262358885962

I figured for $3.10 and free shipping how could I go wrong. Yep, like I need another recording. :-)

Frank
Yep, that's a good one oregonpapa. I believe I have every J.S. Bach title HM put out. Some on LP and CD, which I haven't gotten around to a/b'ing yet. They have a world-class roster of Baroque specialists.
^^^ Yes, they are wonderful recordings ... and many are offered at bargain prices on Ebay. Funny that audiophiles are paying $30 to $50 for an audiophile pressing when for a few bucks they can experience the HM sound. 
Just wanted to add a wholehearted endorsement of the Herbie's tube dampers. I've now installed these on all tubes (signal and power supply) on my ARC Ref40 and Phono 2SE -- all I can say is wow!  Compared with the original rubber rings the difference is night and day, a whole layer of distortion disappears. Vocal tracks that I had written off as etched or edgy are now totally clear and a wealth of high end detail comes through that had been masked before. This is particularly apparent on leading edges of percussion making it much easier to distinguish between different types of cymbals

At first blush it may seem as if some of the "impact" is diminished but I put this down to removal of a sort of echo around major dynamic edges

Anyway wholeheartedly recommended and thanks for the tip oregonpapa -- now to get more for my power amps