Top resistors

Bigkidz,
Thank you for the update on Shinko resistors. I see Shinkoh Tantalum Resistors offered at Hifi collective. Are they the same as your Shinko resistors -Regards Jet

Halo All,

I am planning to buy the shinkoh resistor for my SS power amp. I have never use Shikoh before and some people mention old and new shinkoh are different.

PCX carries the shinkoh, are they the same or different one?


Thanks

I personally don't know the difference between old and new, my experience is recent within the past 3 years.  Also Caddock makes a very nice sounding resistor so for the prices of resistors, but several and try them for your self.  I mostly buy from Parts Connexion.  Happy Listening.

I’m sure everyone would agree that assessing sonic characteristics of parts in a complex audio system is extremely challenging due to component interactions, but here’s my experience.

Shinkohs and Riken Ohms are nice, but just too colored, in a nice way, to use more than just a few. Have tried the old Holcos, but despite added clarity, they were a little thin sounding in the system I had back then. The Dales are natural sounding as are the old Resistas, but neither of these are as transparent as the naked Vishays.

I think the resistor of choice is the TX2575. There may be some ultimate limits even on these. After swapping in almost 80 of these in the signal path of my 2 hybrid tube amps, 60 in the crossovers, and 70 in the phono stage, I had to put 2 Resistas back in to restore a little more midbass/lower mid-range warmth (the Dales would have worked equally well). That’s all it took. Sadly, I did lose just a touch of transparency.

There are always some tradeoffs. Everyone has there own preferences. It’s really amazing (maddening?) how much changing only a couple of parts can dramatically change the sound of a decent audio system. I’m hoping to be done with all this soon!

@pbnaudio

Fusible and flame-proof resistors are quite common in the electronics industry but usually in an amplifier, not a crossover. :) The idea of the former is just like you would expect. When power is exceeded they are guaranteed to open, instead of potentially shorting or catching on fire, and save the rest of the device from a complete meltdown.

Duelund's are really weird. One of their selling points is that they have a high sensitivity to heat and power so will change values rapidly. The very last thing I want in a power resistor! :)

For speakers I stick with Mills. VERY thermally stable, very quite, very tight specs, and really small for the wattages. Also reasonably priced, all things considered.

I do want to someday work for a speaker company that will let me build with some caddock resistors and heat sink them, but so far I haven't the time / energy / funds to experiment with them.