Excellent review of CAPACITORS Must read

Nice review. I have saved it for when I might find some flex-time of my own to study it.

Here are a few other good comparisions of caps. They deal with crossovers.

http://www.humblehomemadehifi.com/Cap.html

http://www.10audio.com/sonicap_oimp_multicap.htm

I thought the review was interesting, but honestly, when you look at the bottom line, TFTF V-caps are ridiculously expensive. A pair of 1.0 uF/600VDC will run you $440. A pair of 3.3 uF cost $1200. Yes, I know there are some people who can afford cost-no-object caps, but most of us can't - including manufacturers. Don't mistake the V-caps in this review for the cheaper line of oil impregnated metallized polypropylene (OIMP). They aren't the same. It would have been useful if the author reviewed them, but he didn't. The 10audio site (mentioned by Irish65) compares the OIMP V-caps, but the reviewer is different and so are the conditions.

Here's an excellent site for capacitor info and recommendations:

http://ldsg.snippets.org/appdx-ec.php

If you ever need an honest unbiased opinion about what cap to use for a given application, Jeff at Sonicap is an incredible resource. The guy knows more about caps than anyone I've talked to. He's very generous with his time and he's a super nice fellow to boot. Not once did he push Sonicaps on me while I was interested in other brands.

http://www.soniccraft.com/sonicap.htm

Given that my linestage uses the V-caps and my Audionote monoblocs use their silver caps, I should be in agreement with the ratings.

But, even if we could all agree on what constitutes "best" sonic results, which parts best achieve that result would depend entirely on particular design and implementation. I've heard the result of people pulling caps chosen by a particular designer and replacing them with supposedly superior Blackgates; it was not good.

This review does provide some support for the notion that parts are not just parts and the choice of particular parts make a difference. It also shows that in the particular design of linestage, certain specific parts were preferred by the reviewer. But this experience can hardly be generalized further.

However, what is useful if other designers and DIY folk chime in so that a whole body of experience can be evaluated. For this reason, I think this "review" is an interesting start.

Larry, I couldn't agree more. Capacitors can't be evaluated in a vacuum. This review is definitely a positive contribution to the community. I didn't mean to suggest otherwise. The author had a task at hand. He outlined it clearly and added the usual caveats.

My gripe isn't with the review per se. My issue is with expensive components in general. I'd like to see more reviews deal with cost-to-performance ratios. I know this wasn't his objective, but I think the majority of audiophiles want this kind of information - even if it's subjective and opinionated. Tech specs will never be able to describe detail, spaciousness, transparency or soundstage. We will always rely on other people's perceptions to make our decisions. Very few people have the means to do the AB comparisons.

I also want to add that capacitors are something of a dark art. It's hard to understand them even when you have good information. This is true with most audio components, but it's particularly difficult when you're trying to identify the sound characteristics of a component so far upstream. The test conditions are critically important. The same person has to do the testing with the same system. This is why I wish he had evaluated the OIMP V-caps. It would have been incredibly useful to the larger audio community.

-Mark