2. amps-preamps
  3. 192205-171531

I hate to say it, but now I think maybe I like my amp in ultralinear mode versus triode

It's a Cary V-12; it features a dozen EL34s and each pair has a switch in between them that configures that pair to either triode or ultralinear. In full triode Cary listed in the specs that it makes 50 wpc and in full ultralinear 100 wpc.   For most of the twenty three years that I have owned this amp I have always felt that I preferred triode except for the occasions that I wanted to full out blast (it has literally been many years since I've felt the need to full out blast).

However, today I experimented with a couple of things in my system, and after listening to the same "Jazz Essentials" (compilation) red book CD a couple of times all the way through, the next thing I experimented with was switching to full ultralinear.

Maybe there was more "PRaT"?  (Which is a term I am still not sure that I completely grasp.)  Maybe . . . but what I do feel I noted for sure was that the imaging (particularly the imaging in the center) had more weight (meatier?) and was presented more forward, which I actually like.

I put a few more hours in (one more time with Jazz Essentials, Holly Cole/It Happened One Night, Dave's True Story/Sex Without Bodies, selected tracks from Rebecca Pigeon/The Raven and Once Blue/self titled and Norah Jones/Feels Like Home) after switching to ultralinear.  (No booze during this session, just coffee.) The jury is still out on this, but I do have some CDs in mind that I want to listen to over the next few days as I continue to evaluate.  

immatthewj
immatthewj OP
2,023 posts
 

@atmasphere 

which is why you can't use the same output transformer with EL34s and 6L6s unless there is a tap for each tube type.

I am not arguing with you because I have already admitted that I am rather cluelss about how this stuff works,

but in the manual for the V12, Dennis Had is saying that tubes that can be roled in this amp include;  6L6, KT88, 6550, KT90, KT66, "even 6V6."

Again, with not intent of being argumentative, does this sound incorrect?  (I was actually asking @decooney  if he had rolled any tubes besides EL34s as I do have some 6550s for another amp, and I can bias the V12 for just two tubes aside.)  Reaching out to Dennis, who is no longer with cary, about an amp he made over 20 years ago is probably a dead end, and as far as this goes, I definitely want to stay on the "better safe than sorry" end of any deal.

immatthewj OP
2,023 posts
 

I have no recall, was I rude? Mean? I've regressed to teenage behavior?

No, @elliottbnewcombjr , it seemed pretty much made in jest and that's the way I took it.  But I remembered the convo yesterday as I was listening.

immatthewj OP
2,023 posts
 

It's always a pleasure to read about a fellow hifi enthusiast who has owned and enjoyed decades of music through their gear!

@jimmyblues1959 , it's been "a long strange trip . . ."  (Not really, but it was fun to say.)  

bolong
611 posts
 

The more refined my system has become the more I default to ultralinear especially so with the addition of Audio Magic M2 fuses to several components which seem to make all aspects of the music sound more "behaved."

 

 

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