[Hoppergrass]

i currently own a singlepower ppx3 slam, and was thinking of selling and upgrading to a ray samuels raptor. after doing a bit of reading here i'm not sure if that upgrade would be worth the cost. does anyone have experience with both amps? my set up will be iMod to either K701 or darth beyers. so my current questions are...sell and buy raptor? send in ppx3 to singlepower and let them do upgrades to it? or is the ppx3 slam good enough that i'll have to spend LOTS of money to gain a noticeable difference in sound?

 

[tkam]

The Raptor wouldn't be an upgrade at all, depending on your budget I'd look into a SinglePower Extreme or the Zana Deux.

 

[Hoppergrass]

yeah i looked at the zana deux but it's a bit more than i want to spend at the moment. thanks for the comments and more are welcome.

 

[augustwest]

The Raptor is a nice amp. Whether it would be worth trading from a PPX SLAM is debatable, however? What is it about the PPX SLAM that is not suiting your needs? . . . . . I'm curious, because I too owned a PPX SLAM and sold it to get something else.

- augustwest

 

[MaloS]

Quote:

Originally Posted by tkam /img/forum/go_quote.gif The Raptor wouldn't be an upgrade at all, depending on your budget I'd look into a SinglePower Extreme or the Zana Deux.

It could very much be an upgrade depending on the user's tastes. If you take someone like me - who just does not have a taste for what SP amps do, Raptor is just marvelous.

 

[Hoppergrass]

Quote:

Originally Posted by augustwest /img/forum/go_quote.gif The Raptor is a nice amp. Whether it would be worth trading from a PPX SLAM is debatable, however? What is it about the PPX SLAM that is not suiting your needs? . . . . . I'm curious, because I too owned a PPX SLAM and sold it to get something else. - augustwest

well, since getting into this hobby i've decided to have one nice SS amp and one nice tube amp. with the K701s i like both my slam and my heed canamp but with the darth beyers i find that i prefer the canamp. that little thing is a monster! so i'm having a hard time justifying having a tube amp worth twice as much that doesn't sound any better.

 

[robm321]

Quote:

Originally Posted by augustwest /img/forum/go_quote.gif The Raptor is a nice amp. Whether it would be worth trading from a PPX SLAM is debatable, however? What is it about the PPX SLAM that is not suiting your needs? . . . . . I'm curious, because I too owned a PPX SLAM and sold it to get something else. - augustwest

What was that something else?

 

[augustwest]

"What was that something else?"

I had a MPX built to suit my needs.

- augustwest

 

[guzziguy]

When I was looking for an amp to power AKG 340s that I had already bought, the Raptor was one of the amps I tried. For me, they did not go together well at all. The music was sterile and one-dimensional. It wasn't just "OK", it was bad. I much preferred the Xana Deux, MPX3 SE and PPX3 Slam with them. Shortly thereafter I bought a PPX3 Slam. I've since had that upgraded to a Platinum Extreme.

The moral? It depends on your other equipment and your taste. I would have found going from the Slam to a Raptor to be a serious downgrade, others would find it to be a lateral move and other would think that it was a fantastic upgrade. You have to go listen with your equipment and decide for yourself.

DB's actually like lots of power to control the bass. For them, I think that moving to a Platinum Extreme would be a nice upgrade, especially if you get the separate power supply so you can run 6528 output tubes (continously). Of course, that's my taste!

I do have some DBs on order and have only listened to one borrowed pair through my Extreme. I'm considering upgrading to the separate power supply too.

Good luck with your search!

 

[guzziguy]

Quote:

Originally Posted by augustwest /img/forum/go_quote.gif "What was that something else?" I had a MPX built to suit my needs. - augustwest

Does it?

 

[robm321]

Quote:

Originally Posted by guzziguy /img/forum/go_quote.gif When I was looking for an amp to power AKG 340s that I had already bought, the Raptor was one of the amps I tried. For me, they did not go together at all. The music was sterile and one-dimensional. I much preferred the Xana Deux, MPX3 SE and PPX3 Slam with them. Shortly thereafter I bought a PPX3Slam. I've since had that upgraded to a Platinum Extreme. The moral? It depends on your other equipment and your taste. I would have found going from the Slam to a Raptor to be a serious downgrade, others would find it to be a lateral move and other would think that it was a fantastic upgrade. You have to go listen with your equipment and decide for yourself. DB's actually like lots of power to control the bass. For them, I think that moving to a Platinum Extreme would be a nice upgrade, especially if you get the separate power supply so you can run 6528 output tubes. Of course, that's my taste! I do have some DBs on order and have only listened to one borrowed pair through my Extreme. Good luck with your search!

He offers that? I have a PPX (non-slam) sitting around. How much ~ to get it upgraded to an extreme?

 

[guzziguy]

Quote:

Originally Posted by robm321 /img/forum/go_quote.gif He offers that? I have a PPX (non-slam) sitting around. How much ~ to get it upgraded to an extreme?

Yes, he does that. I'd rather not give figures as pretty much each SP amp is custom and rarely do any two cost the same. It depends on whether you go to Extreme or Extreme Platinum, whether you want Black Gates in the output section, separate power supply, etc. Mikhail tends to discount a bit as you include more options in an order. I will say that the cost is not near as bad as buying something new. Give Mikhail a call and find out for sure though it mind end up being harmful to your wallet.

I just looked at your profile. Too bad you didn't know this weekend. You could have talked to Mikhail in person. I also see that you have a 6CG7 PPX3. While you can upgrade this to Extreme status (I think), not having an octal socket in the gain tube position really limits your choices to just the 6CG7 family of tubes (Again I think. Someone will correct me if I'm wrong

). All of the adapters I've seen are from whatever tube is being supported to basically looking like a 6SN7. So you would need the loctal socket and underlying support to use the adaptors and their supported tubes.

 

[Happy Camper]

Now I'm curious. What is the ballpark price of a seperate power supply? This and the teflon Vcap outputs on the platinum might well be worth the upgrade. I just don't know if the vcaps would be a value upgrade from the bgs.

 

[Icarium]

v-caps are far superior to blackgates.

 

[Icarium]

I am talking with Mikhail and he said the external supply and depending on transformer 350-425