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In Reply to: RE: Best sounding low voltage coupling capacitors (for a solid state circuit) posted by Lew on October 08, 2021 at 09:31:08
I really like cheap mylar Roederstein MKT (green squares) caps. Probably one of the nicest sounding caps ever produced.
Expensive teflon caps like Vh audio will have a longer break- in time than you're likely to keep the gear. Vintage PIO's are a crapshoot. Electrocubes which Lamm uses are excellent but there is no distributor.
Follow Ups:
Sure woj, and I got a nice bridge to sell you.
Denied facts are still facts.
Only in good ole' USA a family can own a bridge as it is the case of The Ambassador Bridge spanning across Detroit river to Canada. Billions in trade goes over that bridge every year so sure I'll buy the bridge from you ASAP:)
I replaced a load o VH copper caps from Audio NOte phono board (caps costed more than the whole phono stage) because the result was mediocre. I put Audio Note copper there and all fell into place. Later my friend (and owner of the phonostage) started obsessing over AN silver PIO's $$$$. I told him that his whole chain sits on copper and the sound won't balance with silver caps but he didn't listen. Another costly exercise..I bought a pair of 0.22 copper VH caps for pennies from a guy who put back $0.50 mylar caps which were originally installed in his amp. He bought the amp from a "Tweaker1500" and wanted to reverse to original voicing which was a lot more pleasing.
I read about RTX caps so much that I bought 4x0.47uF/630V to make a pair of output caps for my EAR834 Clone. After a year and half of break-in time I gave up and sourced Electrocube 950 series caps and I never looked back.
I don't even want to look inside my $12k Nagra PLP pre and it's shitload of .25$ wholesale ROE PP coupling Capacitors.
I'm not saying that designer caps are crap. It's just a guess and a bit of good luck or a lot of experience to determine what will work in what position in the circuit in what system. Nothing wrong with having a fun chasing that rabbit though. Still cheaper than a pro hooker ..
Edits: 10/08/21
Excellent retort, I must say. You certainly make a great case for those caps to be listened to since you clearly did your homework. Hard to believe though. It would revolutionary it they are readily available and your perception was shared by other aficionados.
Denied facts are still facts.
Eh, I don't know. The caps I mentioned may sound very pedestrian to you and it's OK. Audio Research extensively used multi caps in their reference line before they developed their own gold cased caps and although it's not my sound aesthetics it worked for them. VH are in business for many years now so clearly they offer a valuable service and make people happy. It takes years or decades to acquire the experience and if you have it and can make a recommendation all the power to you. I read all the negative opinions about Hovland caps which were once darlings of everybody and it didn't stop me from enjoying Hovland preamplifier which was full of them. It was a really nice unit in every regard.
The only instance you can sort of trust an online opinion on audio subject is that the person expressing it is in the same sandbox as you are.
Blessed to be the waves of audio fashion which allow us, a poor bastards to acquire out of fashion gems cheaply :)
I smiled at your comment about Hovland. I remember the ads quoting Joe Roberts of Sound Practices magizine, who highly praised them. Wow, if a SET guy likes them...
It's funny how the "darlings" come and go, isn't it? I seem to recall a similar pattern with AuriCaps, which then fell out of favor.
I tried both of them, and several others over the years, as output coupling caps in one of my tube preamps. I kept coming back to a Wima MKP 10 bypassed with a 0.1 uF MultiCap RTX (and later a 0.1 uF Soviet Teflon), the Wima/polystyrene combo having been recommended to me by a veteran builder.
I understood why many liked these other caps, but they gave me too much of an "18th row center" depth. Given I listen to Blues and Rock, the bypassed Wima sounded more upfront, which suited my music better.
I'm going to try the Soviet KBG (PIO) caps (another darling) in place of the bypassed Wima, if I can ever figure out where to fit them.
And while on the topic of general opinions, bypassing coupling caps was once nearly standard practice, then reports of "it causes smearing" began to take over. Given all this is circuit seasoning, what suits others may not be to my taste, but sorting that out can sometimes get expensive.
It's interesting what you wrote about bypassed Wima MKP10. I have a load of those Wima caps bypassing 12 PSU caps in my Audio Aero Equilibre PP amp and coupling caps are Wima bypassed by Hovlands. I also considered the "upgrade" because of so called smearing effect I'm reading on different forums all the time. Not to mention condescending (mildly speaking) opinions regarding those Wima caps. But, that French Amp was stirring the pot in US late in late 90's and it's still well regarded so I decided to just leave it alone. My Living Voice speakers are full of Hovland caps as well and I wouldn't dream of upgrading them since Kevin Scott spent years voicing that model. At the end "we like what we like" my friend said when I remarked that his 2a3 SET amp is choking on Altec 414 based speakers in big basement with his music of choice :) But he follows Joe Esmila path and what's good for Joe must be good for him as well. Myself I don't mind mylar film coupling caps in electronics, electrolytic caps in speakers and fat girls
So you have Living Voice speakers now????
I knew that you could not keep a good man down....
Retsel
There is no 'smearing' anywhere close to the audio bandwidth. people who make that claim have no knowledge of what is going on, but they will spread it all over the internet. The proper term is 'propagation delay'. To see this happening, you have to be in the high MHz range, approaching a GHz. I don't think any 'golden ears' can hear that high, nor will any piece of audio gear have the bandwidth to see it happen. Try it for yourself. Parallel a couple of caps of widely different sizes, and hook up a scope and signal generator. Use a square wave. If propagation delay is happening, you WILL see it on a scope. I don't see it even at 100MHz. I DO see it in the GHz range (but you wont see it using audiophile caps, because the lead inductance will become too high way before you get to those frequencies.)
Below is a link to a large cap "shootout", which includes his take on the Wima MKP 10. I'm mostly including that because he found them "more forward" which is also my take.
"Sound: With the WIMA MKP 10 you get a neutral, smooth and well balanced capacitor. For this price range the amount of transparency is quite reasonable and overall the MKP 10 is pleasant to listen to. Compared to the similar shaped and sized Mundorf RXF the presentation is more forward and a fraction less clear. But never the less it has good overall sound qualities. Don't forget to give it some time to burn-in. Fresh out of the box they sound restricted and dynamics are limited. After several weeks of use they should open-up.
Verdict: 8"
As your friend said, "we like what we like", and there's no universal "This is the best [cap, resistor, tube, etc] in the world, despite what some would have us believe.
One Wima I've read very few negatives about are the DC Links. I've yet to be able to try an all film cap power supply due to space limitations, but that's one I'm looking forward to hearing for myself.
"Myself I don't mind mylar film coupling caps in electronics, electrolytic caps in speakers and fat girls" A very easy to please "audiophile". This,IMO lends some cred to the fact that mylar might just not be the best cap in the whole wide world. Just sayin'.
Denied facts are still facts.
Electrocube capacitors still are made? That's a blast from the past. Yep, I know about VH Audio. I like them but was wondering about lower voltage caps that might also be smaller in size.
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