Cary SLI-80HS modifications

@doyle3433 @pehare  Did you check the bias before your first listen or did you trust that Cary set the bias correctly prior to sending your new amp to you?
 

 I’m taking delivery of mine tomorrow and I’d like to listen for a week before fussing with the bias.  Yes I know it’s easy, I’ve done it a dozen times, but it still seems to take me 45 minutes and I’m going to do it in a week anyway to ensure it’s stable.  Damn I’m impatient!

The bias on my current SLI-80 was incredibly stable. Unless replacing power tubes, I’d check it once a year and it would be within a mA or 2 of the initial setting (75 mA for KT-88s).

@txp1 Yes, I did power up the 1st time w/the bias plug in and once it was warmed up it was a little high just under 80mA so I backed off each channel to 73.  Could have been the line voltage variation from Cary's bench and my home.

@txp1 I decided to wait about a week. Like @pehare Mine was slightly high when I did check bias, so I backed down slightly. Otherwise right out of the box, no fuss no muss. I was startled at how good it sounds with my Volti’s. When I visited Greg at Volti to pick my Razz up, he had me listen to another pair of Razz with the Cary and it was great. Perhaps because my room is about a quarter the size of his, my set up is even more alive and involving to me. Sweet and effortless.

Next step is to pick @decooney 's brain about some tube rolling.. 🙂

Enjoy your new amps fellas!

@doyle3433 can you look at your order build sheet to confirm which coupling caps they installed in your HS model?  Also, I'm not familiar with what stock tubes they come with now days, is it still Electro Harmonix or something else now?

I'm helping or tracking along with a friend with his SLI 80, and he's rolled several output tubes and at least 4 different input tubes on his own, and seemingly not "there" yet. Now he's replaced all the KT88s, trying different EL34s, wanting that type of midrange sound for his 3-way Klipsch Hersey IVs, which are NOT like his former Hersey IIIs. He's acting super itchy now wanting to swap out the stock (lower version) Mundorf caps his came with. I'm talking about someone who swaps coupling caps more frequently than most people change tubes - that kind of over obsession. We'll see.  We talked and thought it was best to let the amp truly burn in another 30 days before jumping to conclusions, screwing with the caps yet, its too early imo. For now, maybe its worth doing some research to determine what other type amp/tubes work well with you Volti Razz (other than Gary Dews 300B amp). Its helpful to decide if you want to keep KT88s or attempt EL34 instead, and only you can answer what's missing from the sound after its burned in at least 30-45 days, would be my suggestion. You might like it stock after its all settled in, yet I don't recall how much time you have on this amp/tubes/caps overall. .