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Jolida JD-100A Tube Rolling

I recently added a JD-100A to my system and am wondering if any of your experiences were similar to mine. Out of the box this unit had about 15hrs on it, so it was basically new. I found the sound to warm, but very blurry in the details and imaging. Seeing all of the very positive posts about this unit, decided that I needed to allow more burn-in time for both me and the CDP and I'm very glad that I did. Even with the stock Jolida/WhateverTheStockTubesAre tubes, it really opened up to sound amazingly live with some of the detail coming back - Diana Krall "Only Trust Your Heart" became an amazing recording (recorded in live 2-track).

Deciding to start rolling tubes, I bought a pair of GE Triple Mica 5751's and immediately noticed a dramatic increase in detail - my wife woke up from a nap to comment on how much clearer the sounds were. I could hear Karen Carpenter's lip smacks on "A Song for You". But with this added detail, feel that a lot of the warmth of the stock tubes was gone.

I'd be very interested in any other experiences.

Thanks.

Russ

PS - Have a pair of Sylvania 12AX7A's in transit.
russtom

Showing 2 responses by newbee

newbee
4,767 posts
 
Russ, Detail and warmth are sort of competetitive - its tough to get both in any piece of equipment, including tubes, especially at any nominal expense. I'm not familar with your electronics, but I use 12ax7's in 2 of my DAC's and in one of my pre amps - I have found the cleanest new production tube available is the Yugo EI. The only caveat is that some can be noisy. The good news is they are very cheap so you can buy a few extra in case you get a noisy one or two. Just something to research further if the Sylvania's don't do it for you.
newbee
4,767 posts
 
Nealhood, Its not your ears - I used this tube for a while and agree that its is best used in a low res system. The Sovtek 12AX7LPS is a much better tube (don't get old ones - they had some reliability problems (at least mine did).
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