Feliks Audio Echo (new budget OTL amp)

[JM1979]

Does the Echo respond well to rolling the driver tubes?

 

[Kevin Lee]

I want to know too

Does the Echo respond well to rolling the driver tubes?

 

[Kevin Lee]

I roll these driver tubes. Better separation and more tight bass with clean top end.

 

[Rebel Chris]

Thanks, gonna try those tubes. I do like the stock tubes very much though.

 

[Greeni]

Feliks Echo is OTL design meant to drive difficult loads?
Does it works well with efficient phones like the wooden Grado RS1e/RS2e?

 

[Rebel Chris]

It drives my grado's superb (GH2, SR325, PS500e) as well as my ZMF Eikon. Don't have really difficult to drive headphones. It's silent when not playing music.

The echo does surprise my: for a budget tube amp it preforms well.

The stock tubes are fine. The Tesla e88cc does sound different (better bass, separation +/- can't tell).

 

[E8ArmyDiver]

Has anyone experimented with upgrading internal parts?For instance the TOL uses the following & I wonder how far the Echo would go with similar mods.I know just get the TOL but I DON'T like the TOL model,I like the simplicity of the Echo & I really like the choice of tubes it uses...

• 100% pure silver signal wiring in teflon jacket
• Heavy duty teflon gold-plated tube sockets
• High quality Mundorf and Nichicon capacitors
• Dale and Caddock resistors....
  Any thoughts?

 

[qboogie]

Can anyone elaborate on what makes the Echo only an entry level OTL amp, and what exactly is gained by upgrading to the Euforia?

 

[rgrcliffe]

Can anyone elaborate on what makes the Echo only an entry level OTL amp, and what exactly is gained by upgrading to the Euforia?

I was wondering the same thing myself. I own an Echo, and I really like it. I was thinking what kind of difference I would hear in a more expensive amp for purely headphone listening.

 

[E8ArmyDiver]

"qboogie
100+ Head-Fier
JoinedAug 17, 2019LocationNew York City, NYPosts188Likes93
Can anyone elaborate on what makes the Echo only an entry level OTL amp, and what exactly is gained by upgrading to the Euforia?"

I was wondering the same thing myself. I own an Echo, and I really like it. I was thinking what kind of difference I would hear in a more expensive amp for purely headphone listening.

It is labeled "Entry Level"because there are more expensive models above it.It is ABSOLUTE RELIGIOUS DOGMA that a product can NOT be considered TOTL/End Game unless it is in the Top 10% cost of a given product line or hobby(head-fi)REGARDLESS OF HOW IT PERFORMS..It is also ABSOLUTE DOGMA that in SUBJECTIVE reviewing,NO ENTRY LEVEL priced product will ever be chosen as better than a more expensive competitor!It will ALWAYS be said that MORE $ gets better components internally,better sounding tubes & better construction..
Read ANY positive review of ANY product and it will ALWAYS be stated that product X is the absolute best I ever heard or it performed wonderfully,IN IT"S PRICE BRACKET but product Y is better overall because it cost twice as much...
I recently started a thread in Summit Fi,asking what products were considered by the community overall as End Game but priced so they were affordable..There has been ZERO replies..

 

[OctavianH]

Can anyone elaborate on what makes the Echo only an entry level OTL amp, and what exactly is gained by upgrading to the Euforia?

I would say that the biggest advantage of Elise/Euforia is the use of 6SN7/6AS7 types of tubes which provide enormous rolling capabilities. I owned in the past the Littledot MK2 which uses the same tube types as Echo and when I upgraded to Elise the difference was huge in terms of clarity, separation and so on. I would not say that Echo is not a good amp, it might be, but Elise and Euforia are in a different league. But of course, these tube types are more expensive and you should worry not about the amplifier price, but the price you will pay on all the tubes you will want to try, which would be, most probably, several times more than the amplifier itself.

 

[rgrcliffe]

when I upgraded to Elise the difference was huge in terms of clarity, separation and so on.

Was the difference apparent with the stock tubes? How much better did it get when you rolled the tubes?

 

[Halam]

The choice of tubes can be greatly expanded by the use of 5670 and 12**7 family tubes with adapters. And it can be cheaper also, comparing to the best 6922 family tubes. You can find a huge amount of useful information in Schiit Lyr Tube Roller thread. 12**7 family is popular now in this thread, but 5670 is not worse. All you need is a cheap Chinese adapter from eBay ( or better quality one from Tubemonger). I personally use 5670 RCA COMMAND SERIES NOS "O" getter halo 1968 with adapter in my Echo and it's sound much better then the stock tubes.

 

[OctavianH]

Was the difference apparent with the stock tubes? How much better did it get when you rolled the tubes?

It is hard to comment on this since I bought it without tubes and bought separately what I needed. Anyway, I have in my collection a pair of Svetlana 6H13C which, as far as I know, are provided as stock output tubes and I consider them decent, at let's say 6/10 but other power tubes like for example Tung Sol 5998, Bendix 6080WB or GEC 6AS7G are around 9/10 (of course, every assessment is subjective, a matter of taste, of synergy with the rest of the line and headphones and so on, take it with a grain of salt). For the drivers I have no idea, I do not own a pair of those.

 

[rgrcliffe]

The choice of tubes can be greatly expanded by the use of 5670 and 12**7 family tubes with adapters. And it can be cheaper also, comparing to the best 6922 family tubes. You can find a huge amount of useful information in Schiit Lyr Tube Roller thread. 12**7 family is popular now in this thread, but 5670 is not worse. All you need is a cheap Chinese adapter from eBay ( or better quality one from Tubemonger). I personally use 5670 RCA COMMAND SERIES NOS "O" getter halo 1968 with adapter in my Echo and it's sound much better then the stock tubes.

Thank you very much for this information. I will have a look at the Schiit Lyr thread as you suggested. It sounds an interesting first path for me to try. Presumably, there is no risk of damaging the amplifier using this family of tubes through an adaptor?