To all you Cary SLI 80 owners, I'm looking for tube suggestions
Hello all, I have a one year old Cary SLI 80 HS and I have not changed a thing on it. Same tube set it came from the factory with. KT88's are Psvane, input tubes are JJ's. It is a sublime match with my Volti Razz speakers.
My question is this, what have you all tried with rolling tubes? Anyone try output variants? EL34's, KT 77 or 66's. Or have you changed out input tubes and noted and enjoyable difference?
Any and all suggestions would be welcome.
Thank you,
Doug
- ...
- 23 posts total
I see that Cary lists a number of tubes you can use in the amp. KT66 is not one of them and I would not recommend trying them in an amp that boasts 40 wpc output in triode mode and 80 wpc in UL mode. You’re in danger of overheating the tubes and maybe damaging the amp. In my experience an EL34 will have more midrange emphasis and "warmth" than a KT88. I would suggest Svetlanas. Again, IME, they have the warmest midrange of any EL34s I’ve used. But I think that any quality EL34 will give you the extra warmth that you’re looking for. The Shuguangs mentioned get very good comments and might be an option. |
@jond , I am pretty much clueless about this stuff, so the last time I needed a dozen EL34s I emailed Jim McShane and told him I was kind of interested in the GL KT77s. He actually suggested the reissued Tungsols El34s, as he said there might be issues with biasing the KT77s in my amp (Cary V12). I replied back that if he thought I’d be happier with the EL34s, by all means let's do that. He replied back with something to the effect of that wasn’t what he said; what he said was biasing might be problematic. I don’t know if ’might’ was the operative word, but I bought the reissued Tungsols. I have been really happy with those tubes and I was really happy with Jim’s service. (He emailed me two or three times to tell me how the burn-in and matching was going. If he wasn’t getting out of the business, I’d buy my next set from him.) As an aside, I see that on the site that @decooney listed, Dougs Tubes, JJ has a KT77 available.
|
- 23 posts total