[tomb]

Quote:

Nelson Pass said that the Elna silks are the best electrolytic capacitor he's heard and measured.

I would agree with that statement.  The Elna Silmic RFS II's are the best things I've ever used - either small (47uf) or large (1000uf).  Black Gates? Bah - good riddance to the hype and the price.
 
 

 

[Malefoda]

Best only for power rails caps.

 

[Avro_Arrow]

Elna Silmic II

 

[Malefoda]

Yes I meant Mr. Pass love them in supplies, and OsCons do wonder on digital... but for coupling where large capacity is required there is no clear choice. Or a Muse ES bipolar, the bypass being the real choice?

 

[tomb]

Quote:

Yes I meant Mr. Pass love them in supplies, and OsCons do wonder on digital... but for coupling where large capacity is required there is no clear choice. Or a Muse ES bipolar, the bypass being the real choice?

Elna Silmic II's are better than Muse ES's - and I love ES's.  I was also only referring to coupling, not power supplies.  It's hard to beat a Panasonic FM in power supplies, but they stink in coupling applications.  Elna's would be wasted in power supplies, IMHO.
 
 

 

[digger945]

If you google capacitor comparisons, you will find some who think that Elna capacitors are better than Blackgates, even NX Blackgates, as used in both power supply and coupling. 
 
I recently listened to a Bottlehead Crack amp, at a local meet, that used high voltage Panasonic TS series caps for output coupling. It sounded very very good to me. I've never heard the HD650's sound better.
 
If you look at the data sheet for the capacitor in question, you will probably notice that the power correction factor for the ESR will change, sometimes quite drastically, with frequency. The linearity of the part will depend somewhat on this factor. This coefficient of frequency is less with the Elna caps than some others.

 

[slowpogo]

Elna Silmics (both I and II) are good at reproducing the timbres of acoustic instruments. So things like acoustic guitar take on a very natural, 3D quality where you can hear the scrape of the pick on the strings, etc. But somehow in spite of this, they have a kind of dark gray, dampened sound. I can't describe it too well, but I don't like it. I recognize that they do some things well but if we're talking replacement for the Black Gate NX, the Silmics have nothing on those caps. I actually like the Silmic I a little better than the II - it doesn't have the thick lower midrange, which gives the II a tubey sound that many seem to like. I prefer the more natural EQ of the Silmic I.
 
I still think it's funny that some assume the Black Gates were all hype. They were most definitely a very nice capacitor, easy to argue as the best available. Were they worth the high cost? As much as I like them, I'm not sure about that. For some people, probably not, but they certainly were not snake oil.

 

[tomb]

 
Quote:

Elna Silmics (both I and II) are good at reproducing the timbres of acoustic instruments. So things like acoustic guitar take on a very natural, 3D quality where you can hear the scrape of the pick on the strings, etc. But somehow in spite of this, they have a kind of dark gray, dampened sound. I can't describe it too well, but I don't like it. I recognize that they do some things well but if we're talking replacement for the Black Gate NX, the Silmics have nothing on those caps. I actually like the Silmic I a little better than the II - it doesn't have the thick lower midrange, which gives the II a tubey sound that many seem to like. I prefer the more natural EQ of the Silmic I.
 
I still think it's funny that some assume the Black Gates were all hype. They were most definitely a very nice capacitor, easy to argue as the best available. Were they worth the high cost? As much as I like them, I'm not sure about that. For some people, probably not, but they certainly were not snake oil.

I understand what you're saying and respect your opinion on the sound - but I still disagree.  I still think the Elna's are better than BG's.  Any advantage, however slight, is overcome by both the price and the very cumbersome requirement for long break-ins (repeatedly required if unused).   As for hype, sorry - Black Gates were always priced about 10 times what they were worth.  More to the point, Jelmax's entire marketing campaign about the "super-E-caps" capacitor arrangement was pure hype.  It was focused solely on trying to get customers to order twice the number of super-over-priced capacitors than they normally would.
 
I hate to be hard-hearted about the whole thing, but the market wins out.  If Black Gates truly offered performance commensurate with their price, they wouldn't have gone through multiple manufacturing suspensions over the years until they finally died out for good.  Were they decent caps?  Yeah, but the rest of it was voodoo. 
 
 

 

[slowpogo]

Quote:

I hate to be hard-hearted about the whole thing, but the market wins out.  If Black Gates truly offered performance commensurate with their price, they wouldn't have gone through multiple manufacturing suspensions over the years until they finally died out for good.
 
 

 
But do we really know the whole story of why production was suspended, and then stopped? It's easy to assume it was purely market demand but there's a whole lot else that could have factored into it. That they are being sold (and bought) on ebay for ridiculous sums would suggest that demand is still there. There are plenty of outlandishly-priced capacitors (Mundorf, etc.) out there that, while probably better than cheaper alternatives, are not better in proportion to the price difference. Yet they have been, and will remain, in production for quite some time. So I don't know that there's a simple answer to all this.

 

[Avro_Arrow]

I thought the reason they were axed was a dispute between Rubycon and the company that was making them.
 
Quote:

 
But do we really know the whole story of why production was suspended, and then stopped? It's easy to assume it was purely market demand but there's a whole lot else that could have factored into it. That they are being sold (and bought) on ebay for ridiculous sums would suggest that demand is still there. There are plenty of outlandishly-priced capacitors (Mundorf, etc.) out there that, while probably better than cheaper alternatives, are not better in proportion to the price difference. Yet they have been, and will remain, in production for quite some time. So I don't know that there's a simple answer to all this.

 

 

[tomb]

Quote:

I thought the reason they were axed was a dispute between Rubycon and the company that was making them.
 


 

True, but money is money.  If a product has a demand and there is profit to be made, then people find a way around such things.  My point is that most of it - at least at the prices that Jelmax was demanding - was hype, period.  Under those circumstances, I think Rubycon got fed up with them.  That's conjecture on my part, but all we're offering are opinions anyway.
 
 

 

[ClieOS]

Never really like the BlackGate I used for coupling caps (one of the last batch of 22uF/6.3V NX Hi-Q sold by Part Connexion). Personally I find Nichicon ES series better sounding in the same application.

 

[qusp]

 
 
blackgate?? meh, i totally dont know what the fuss is about, even with hundreds of hours the sound isnt right around 250-350hz,
 
i just dont like them and would take silmic II or nichicon kz over them any day in signal, especially if the silmic are bypassed with a small pps, polypropylene, or relcap polystyrene film and foil cap. in digital power supply i'll take oscon, or nichicon solid polymer for leaded, for smd the panasonic SP/SX series special polymer caps are in another class @ 0.005ohms, kemet polytantalum smd if very small size is needed such as the newish 1206 size, al bypassed when appropriate with c0g, or ps film, bulk decoupling in power supply the nichicon, silmic II for smaller positions, then mundorf or F&T for 2200 up, or for ultrareliable bomb proof high current, the Evox/Rifa PEH169 are impossible to beat for me and if higher performance again is needed and you have the space, adding a 50-200uf unlytic polypropylene shunt to the rifas is unbelievable. blackgate do not even figure in all of that, if cheaper bulk caps with decent performance are needed the pana FC are indeed a great value.
 
i wont go into films, there are plenty of threads on that already and at that level and application i would strive for no cap

 

[AudioCats]

Quote:

True, but money is money.  If a product has a demand and there is profit to be made, then people find a way around such things.  My point is that most of it - at least at the prices that Jelmax was demanding - was hype, period.  Under those circumstances, I think Rubycon got fed up with them.  That's conjecture on my part, but all we're offering are opinions anyway.
 
 

BlackGate relies on too much a nitch market (pretty much tweak/mod applications), doesn't move enough volumn to justify reactivate production.
 
I still think the NX is the best for both signal (when there is size restriction) and power rail. Too bad they are pretty much nowhere to be found nowadays. 

 

[slowpogo]

Quote:

BlackGate relies on too much a nitch market (pretty much tweak/mod applications), doesn't move enough volumn to justify reactivate production.
 

 
I don't know why Black Gates were always the face of expensive boutique parts. What about something like Jensen silver foil capacitors - a 0.22uf cap costs $242. That's an extreme example, but there are plenty of product lines comparable to BG price levels, like the MultiCap RX.  Not everyone thinks they're great, but some certainly do, and these caps fairly expensive; larger values will run you $30 or more.  This is why I always balked at complaints of Black Gates being outrageously overpriced - yeah, they were a lot more than your cheapo industrial caps, but not THAT expensive, and there are plenty of analogous product lines - yet Black Gates took the brunt of the criticism, at least places like here.
 
If you thought they were excellent - which I did - then you were willing to pay an extra $40 to make your Millett Max sound pretty damn good. Sure, I would have rather paid less, but I wasn't nearly as happy with the other caps I tried (I probably spent 3 months swapping in various combinations of caps, letting them burn in a while, and taking notes; ultimately, the BG NX's were very clearly the most satisfying to my ears) so it was worth it. I don't regret having bought about 20 BG caps over the years, whatsoever, and I lament their absence.
 
As far as the burn-in issue, yeah, it does take quite a while for them to reach full potential, and people say with disuse they need to be re-broken-in. But as long as you simply use your amp (which, presumably, you built with the intention of using) then it's not an issue. I pretty much only listen on my Millett Max, basically daily, so I've never, ever had to deal with that and it's a non-issue to me.