2. amps-preamps
  3. 193759-198816

Cary SLP 98 users, past and present, are there any left?

Recently purchased the above mentioned preamp in Jaguar red, has phono section and Lundahl MC upgrade, also Hexfred rectifiers and is direct-coupled. Most of that means little to me but I know the upgrades matter. I am very pleased to far with what I hear and I am listening to nearly new cheap tubes. I'm going to burn them in awhile before deciding what to look for in tube rolling. I have yet to try the phono section as I use my Cary PH301 phono pre and SAEC SUT. Listening to LP12 with Linn Karma LOMC. It all sounds very damn good to me. CD's are easier on the ears than they used to be. I think the tubes tame them down a tad. Currently listening to them on a very old Pioneer DVD player V7400. I think it may sound better than my 20 bit Denon which is up for repairs. 

Cut to the chase, just wanted you guys to know the electronics, front end anyway. The first time I tried the new Cary, I had the umbilical crossed up and only the phono stage seemed to engage. The PS got quite warm. It still runs warm and that is the question. How warm should it run? It's certainly not too hot to touch but it is warm, I'd say twice as warm as my PH301 PS, which is about the same case. It does sound very good. I'm just hoping that I didn't cause harm in my first session. Was only a few minutes but knew something was wrong and found that the umbilical was the problem. I was shocked that it was possible to put it together incorrectly. Never had that trouble on the PH301.

Anyway, overall, I am very pleased and know that I will likely be looking at different tubes down the road. Only complaint is the remote. 5k preamp and 50 cent remote. Kind of cheesy. Not enough to be displeased with anything, just an observation.

billpete
billpete OP
298 posts
 

@erik_squires 

@immatthewj 

Have inverted pos neg speaker wires. Wil let you know what I hear. AR9's are 4 way and have 5 speakers. I tried the battery phase test and found nothing. Not sure what went wrong. 

I am truly baffled by all of this as to how much is in phase and out. All the participation is greatly appreciated. 

erik_squires
16,922 posts
 

@billpete 

The battery test will only tell you which way the woofer goes.  It should move one way or another.  The crossovers up  above will filter DC and prevent you from learning much more.  If you aren't getting much movement, consider a 9V battery, or C/D cell. 

billpete OP
298 posts
 

@erik_squires 

That would explain it then. I only tried the top half and gave up. Surely, they are phased as they are meant to be anyway.

When I reversed the pos neg wires at the speakers, everything sounded wrong to me. Not terrible but not as good either. There was loss of bass and all else seemed muffled, loss of detail I guess. This just can't be how it is meant to be. Maybe mine got changed to normal phasing in one of the upgrades? I have no idea but it sounds too good to be out of phase. I may try it again sometime but my son and I both said the same thing about how it sounded. I only tried two songs on a bass heavy Cd. Switched them back and am back to normal. 

I'm going to contact the guy who I bought it from to see if he has any insight into it as well. Thanks for all the input.

testpilot
991 posts
 

There is an inexpensive app called “Speaker Pop” which can tell you the polarity of each driver. It works as described.  I’ve used to make sure that each speaker was wired with the same polarity. You would be surprised at how many speaker “pairs” are not wired the same. 

billpete OP
298 posts
 

@testpilot 

Thanks. Will check it out. 

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