BEST HARMLESS/SIGNATURELESS SPEAKERS CAPACITORS.

Dear @paulcreed  :  About dull sound there are several " things " to say about but please let me tell you experiences on that specific issue:

in the past ( as I posted here. ) every time I saw a Wima cap in electronics I take off and changed for a " better " cap.

Why I did it that way? well because that dull sound you talk about and when the " better " cap was soldered then that dull sound almost disappears.

Wima puts me in " automatic pilot " for a cap changes.  Sooner or latter we all learn and several years after those kind of " actions " and after overall system changes: electronics, cables, speakers, room conditionined and the like rigth now I'm took in count that several of those way better electronics ( that the ones in the past I used to. ) came with Wima caps not only at the power supply but in the signal path way of those electronics.

The main subject in all those is why these better electronics sounds/performs with so high quality using Wima caps when the before electronics sounds so dull?

easy answer: way better DESIGN. The dull electronics sounded that way because a poor electronic design or bad quality control or bad excecution to those designs. Were not Wima the guilty for that dull sound.

Two examples of those very good electronics designs are Mark Levinson and Krell.

The first Levinson item with the word REFERENCE in its model was the monoblocks amplifier: Reference 20 model that had rave reviews over several years and was an expensive unit.

I don't remember any single comment coming from reviewers or audiophiles telling the Reference 20 sound was: dull, never even today.
After that R20 Levinson puts in the market the stereo amp 23.5 model ( Class AB instead Class A like the 20 design. ) using all Wima caps and guess what: the 23.5 beated the R20 quality level performance and this fact obligated to Levinson to re-design the 20 and they gone out with the 20.5 that outperformed the 23.5 and always with those WIma caps.

After the 20.5's came the 20.6's that I own with some self tweaks ( certainly not on the caps. )/modifications. Still all the caps are Wima.

Thwen came the Levinson Reference 33 ( maybe some of you could remember this big size amps. ) and again with rave reviews coming from every where. 
Then appeared the Levinso first Reference preamp and as usually full of Wima caps and rave reviews too.

Along Levinson Krell was the one to beats and guess what: Krell uses Wima too and Levinson was a very hard competition for the Krell's.

No one told me all those was and are first hand experiences but all the owners and reviewers attest and attested why I liked and like it today. It's not about subjectivity because Levinson/Kreall measurements were second to none.

As I posted Wima can't do nothing for bad or wrong electronic/speaker designs where a boutique/junk caps can do it can " improve it " because are only adding more colorations/distortions.

Behind Wima no single item can hidden all its true quality performance levels.

The main issue it's not me or my system or what I like but the audio item designs.
 I came in this thread with out any single agenda and as a fact waiting for advises on boutique caps not on Wima or Vishay or Epcos and the like because I already " knew " that between other things those cheap caps just can't do it against all that very high engineering and design/tests ( that I never never seen in the manufacturer sites of these caps. ) dedication of the boutique $$$ " wonderful " caps.

Levinson and Krell are not the only today great electronic manufacturers that use the " cheap " caps almost every one use it.

Yes, Wima/ Vishay, Epcos or Kemet is my audio discovery and yes I understand exactly your meaning in your latest posts.

Regards and enjoy the MUSIC NOT DISTORTIONS,
R.

Paul: Before those elctronics first hand experiences I had a similar one with Classé Audio DR-7 phonolinepreamp, NIL 3 ( pre-preamp/headamp ) and the DR-3VHC amplifier.
Was from Classé where I take off " dozens " of diferent Wima caps models and values.

A little late but fortunatelly I learned and I'm still doing day by day.

R.

Dear friends: This cap tests evaluation for my speaker crossover is really complicated due that Vishay, Wima, Kemet and Epcos has each one " hundreds " of models for multiple/several applications and inside each application model exist " dozens " of options to as a choice.

Of course no one of that applications says: speaker crossovers, so I'm buying diferent models of the same values and testing it. Not really an easy task but quite learning one.

Now, things are that sometime inside same manufacturer models and sometimes caps from diferent manufacturers caps performs almost at the same quality performance levels and all signatureless.

The issue down there is: which is the best choice?, very hard to say and what I'm doing is to have in different days using same recordings ( analog/digital. ) listen for a while at high SPL ( always same SPL. ) and I decided that the choice will be and is the cap that after eachh listen session let my ears/brain more " calm " and with the less/lower sensation of that time listening to high SPL's.

I decided that because I had not ( yet ) other better alternative. Advises are welcomed.

All those made it that today my crossovers are a blend of manufacturer caps where no one of them works as a tone control. That's why the blend: colorless.

R.

Btw, sessions at high SPL to make a cap choices and what I posted about does not means that the natural agresiveness and MUSIC brigthness are the ones that determine how or in wich condition my ears finish at each session.

My take is that at high SPL the caps with higher generated distortions are the least " ears " calm because it's more the kind of distortions with the SPL's what really make the diferences.
I check too in diferent sessions at low SPL's and here too is really indicative and help to make the choices.

About type of caps I gone and go for the MKP type but for other kind too. I found out that sometimes non-MKP models beated the MKP ones and the other way around and this fact makes that the number of tests been truly high but always with a learning lesson.

R.

Dear friends: I'm almost at the end of the overall caps in speaker crossover evaluation and by second time inside that evaluation I listened again to those boutique/snake oil expensive caps and was only to confirm that are not passive devices for true high end MUSIC home system reproduction.

Perhaps we can use that kind of cap if we have and want to fix a radio from the 60's ( not a joke. ) but for today audio just are useless.

Perhaps those useless devices manufacturers need to remember or re-think again how performs live MUSIC at near field position.

Maybe some of you think that the world industry is wrong and the only people that are rigth are the manufacturers of that kind of $$$$ devices. Could be?, I know for sure that the answer is NO but this is only an opinion/sand grain in an Ocean where almost every one think diferent from me.

I have no problem with.

R.