[David1961]

An obvious difference In SQ I've found from the BHSE, is between the use of my interconnects. I have copper RCA's, and Pure silver XLR's and I hear that the XLR's improve the detail and transparency quite a bit over the RCA's.
The reason I hear this is because I can make the change over in seconds.
I do use the RCA's with my BHSE though because when using the XLR's, more of the songs in my collection sound uncomfortable from my 009 / BHSE.

I'd sooner not have to change tubes, but I guess I'm influenced when I read posts saying certain tubes make big improvements.

 

[David1961]

An obvious difference In SQ I've found from the BHSE, is between the use of my interconnects. I have copper RCA's, and Pure silver XLR's and I hear that the XLR's improve the detail and transparency quite a bit over the RCA's.
The reason I hear this is because I can make the change over in seconds.
I do use the RCA's with my BHSE though because when using the XLR's, more of the songs in my collection sound uncomfortable from my 009 / BHSE.

I'd sooner not have to change tubes, but I guess I'm influenced when I read posts saying certain tubes make big improvements.

When I said my XLR interconnects improve the detail and transparency from my 009 / BHSE over using the RCA's, it's not necessarily an improvement, just different.

 

[Golfnutz]

Quote:

 
As an alternative perspective, ask yourself whether such changes give you more enjoyment from your system.
 
If you enjoy swapping tubes, re-listening to the same music over and over again to pick up minute differences, more power to you. But for my money, after spending some $7-10k on a BHSE with the 007 or 009, that is completely missing the point. Just chill out and enjoy it.

[size=medium]Beefy, I get your point, but unfortunately I cannot agree with you. Although I’m at a point now where I can finally ‘chill and enjoy the music’.[/size]
 
[size=medium]For me, it really has nothing to do with minute changes in a system. It’s about balance, harmonization, coherency, soundstage, imaging, etc.[/size]
 
[size=medium]Does it sound musical or is it just OK? In other words does it move you? Do you get the sensation that you’re in the studio or just listening to another CD?[/size]
 
[size=medium]How about just sitting there for a couple of hours listening to your system and when you’re done you say to yourself how is possible that just came from a CD.[/size]
 
[size=medium]It isn’t about tube swapping, it’s about finding the right tubes and you’re done.[/size]
 
[size=medium]I agree with Asr and David in terms of the Mullard, JJ, RFT, SED, Shuguang, you really do need a second amp to compare to hear what the difference are. The only thing I’ve said in the past is that one sounded better than the other, but I didn’t know what it was that sounded better – not much of an upgrade really, but some sound marginally better as a whole than others.[/size]

 

[Beefy]

Quote:

[size=medium]Does it sound musical or is it just OK? In other words does it move you? Do you get the sensation that you’re in the studio or just listening to another CD?[/size]

 
If $10k of gear sounds 'just OK', then maybe I am (or you are?) in the wrong hobby.
 
Or maybe we need to call the hyperbole police a bit more often...... because 'marginally better as a whole' does not really describe what people say in this thread and elsewhere.
 
[EDIT] And for the more 'religious' listening experience, I highly recommend certain pharmacological upgrades. Guaranteed to be a better improvement than 'marginally better as a whole' tubes.

 

[karlgerman]

david1961, i thought to make a suggestion to try out one of the fine dac´s from esoteric to make a noticable improvement.
hahaha, then i read you already have. and you are even one step further, you have the bhse. great, congrats to this equipment i´m dreaming of.
 
exploring about sound-improvements i did a lot of switching between sources during my hearing sessions. with the stax amp, this is also very easy without interruption or crackling noise.
but i learnd for myself that hearing sessions worked better for me without switching settings between the songs.
now i prefer the whole session with one setting and change the adjustment with the same playlist for the next day or maybe two days later.
normally i do this for several weeks.
this takes a longer period of time but is the only way the music moves me and give me more confidence in results.
the only exception was the experiment to find out differences between bitperfect-audirvana-puremusic-amarra...and so on.
therefore i used some pink noise and switched many times between the sources.

 

[rgs9200m]

Quote:

An obvious difference In SQ I've found from the BHSE, is between the use of my interconnects. I have copper RCA's, and Pure silver XLR's and I hear that the XLR's improve the detail and transparency quite a bit over the RCA's.
The reason I hear this is because I can make the change over in seconds.
I do use the RCA's with my BHSE though because when using the XLR's, more of the songs in my collection sound uncomfortable from my 009 / BHSE.

I'd sooner not have to change tubes, but I guess I'm influenced when I read posts saying certain tubes make big improvements.

That is an interesting statement, because  I found the same thing with my 009s and 007t/ii amp.
I was really surprised because it's against all reason, but I have the same high quality ICs in both XLR and RCA versions, and the XLRs were more fatiguing than
the RCAs, and the RCAs sound better. 
(This is from the same CDP, and everything else is the same.)
I thought I was imagining things, but repeated A/B tests confirm it.
 
(With my dynamic amps, the XLR route is better, more defined.)

 

[David1961]

That is an interesting statement, because  I found the same thing with my 009s and 007t/ii amp.
I was really surprised because it's against all reason, but I have the same high quality ICs in both XLR and RCA versions, and the XLRs were more fatiguing than
the RCAs, and the RCAs sound better. 
(This is from the same CDP, and everything else is the same.)
I thought I was imagining things, but repeated A/B tests confirm it.

(With my dynamic amps, the XLR route is better, more defined.)

I also use my XLR interconnects with my GS-Xmk2 because for me they do improve the SQ over using the RCA's.

 

[David1961]

david1961, i thought to make a suggestion to try out one of the fine dac´s from esoteric to make a noticable improvement.

hahaha, then i read you already have. and you are even one step further, you have the bhse. great, congrats to this equipment i´m dreaming of.


exploring about sound-improvements i did a lot of switching between sources during my hearing sessions. with the stax amp, this is also very easy without interruption or crackling noise.
but i learnd for myself that hearing sessions worked better for me without switching settings between the songs.
now i prefer the whole session with one setting and change the adjustment with the same playlist for the next day or maybe two days later.
normally i do this for several weeks.
this takes a longer period of time but is the only way the music moves me and give me more confidence in results.
the only exception was the experiment to find out differences between bitperfect-audirvana-puremusic-amarra...and so on.
therefore i used some pink noise and switched many times between the sources.

Thank you for your thoughts on the audio equipment I have.

I've downloaded all my CD's onto my MacMini that I'm using as a music server, which in turn I'm listening to the music on the MacMini via my Esoteric's DAC.
And to my ears there's no difference between the SQ from the DAC, to the SQ from CD's.
I only use my Esoteric's DAC because I can listen to any of the songs in my collection via one finger, I'm not lazy but for me to do that with CD's would be a great deal of messing about, plus it would take quite a bit of time.

Regarding trying different tubes, I can't speak for others, but for me, I don't really know why I might be wanting to do that because the biggest improvement I get from my headphone system is from my source.
IMO the BHSE is a very special amp though.

 

[Golfnutz]

Quote:

 
If $10k of gear sounds 'just OK', then maybe I am (or you are?) in the wrong hobby.
 
Or maybe we need to call the hyperbole police a bit more often...... because 'marginally better as a whole' does not really describe what people say in this thread and elsewhere.
 
[EDIT] And for the more 'religious' listening experience, I highly recommend certain pharmacological upgrades. Guaranteed to be a better improvement than 'marginally better as a whole' tubes.

Now I see why you're ragging on everyone that posts something, you just don't understand English that well...
 
I'm saying the tubes I listed above only bring marginal changes to the BHSE, and you really can't describe what those improvements are other than it sounds just a bit better. Show me a post from this forum or any other sites where someone used any of those tubes and said OMG what a huge difference. Read Asr comments on the KT77.
 
There's only one tube that I can attest to that's done that in my system and that's using the EL34PH with the BHSE. Reliability issues aside and AudioSeptic comments (but then again he couldn't tell the difference between the XF2 and any other tubes either), everyone else who has tried them have noticed the improvements I've described above. I don't know why you think this is hyperbole. Have you even heard a BHSE?

 

[Rico613]

As long as we are talking about other gear . . . . I will be putting my dCS Debussy up for an "interest check" sometime soon.  This would be an excellent DAC for the BHSE.  I wanted to give BHSE folks first crack at this.  Apologies if I'm breaking the rules . . .  PM me if interested . . . Rich
 

 

[audiosceptic]

Quote:

Now I see why you're ragging on everyone that posts something, you just don't understand English that well...
 
I'm saying the tubes I listed above only bring marginal changes to the BHSE, and you really can't describe what those improvements are other than it sounds just a bit better. Show me a post from this forum or any other sites where someone used any of those tubes and said OMG what a huge difference. Read Asr comments on the KT77.
 
There's only one tube that I can attest to that's done that in my system and that's using the EL34PH with the BHSE. Reliability issues aside and AudioSeptic comments (but then again he couldn't tell the difference between the XF2 and any other tubes either), everyone else who has tried them have noticed the improvements I've described above. I don't know why you think this is hyperbole. Have you even heard a BHSE?

 
I can't tell the difference between various EL34 tubes in the BHSE. I can hear EL34 differences in other amps such as my Consonance M10S where the Mullard XF2 reign supreme. I'd try the Psvane EL34PH in my M10S but I'm too afraid to pull them out of my BHSE for fear of center pin breakage so they will stay there until they spark and break (hopefully not soon as another reported).

 

[Golfnutz]

Quote:

 
I can't tell the difference between various EL34 tubes in the BHSE. I can hear EL34 differences in other amps such as my Consonance M10S where the Mullard XF2 reign supreme. I'd try the Psvane EL34PH in my M10S but I'm too afraid to pull them out of my BHSE for fear of center pin breakage so they will stay there until they spark and break (hopefully not soon as another reported).

Thanks for clarifying Audiosceptic, and I hope you didn't take what I said the wrong way. I was only using it as a reference from one of your earlier posts when you first got your BHSE. At the time, others were confirming the XF2 sounded superior to anything else (but you couldn't hear the difference). Based on that it didn't surprise me that you had the same results with the EL34PH.
 
I think if you do get the courage to swap tubes, I'm guessing you'll find whatever goes into the BHSE will sound veil in comparison (assuming the EL34PH have been broken in by that time). 

 

[Rico613]

Quote:

 
I can't tell the difference between various EL34 tubes in the BHSE. I can hear EL34 differences in other amps such as my Consonance M10S where the Mullard XF2 reign supreme. I'd try the Psvane EL34PH in my M10S but I'm too afraid to pull them out of my BHSE for fear of center pin breakage so they will stay there until they spark and break (hopefully not soon as another reported).

 
I tested my EL34PH's in a tube tester and even after polishing the pins they were still tight.  I inserted the tubes about 1/2 way which was good enough for the test and didn't run much risk of breaking the pin.  Clearly more downward/upward force and less wiggling side to side are called for when handling these tubes.
 
When people say they can't hear a difference between audio components when others can, I immediately suspect some other element such as the DAC, or cables, or maybe even oxidation on cable ends or tube sockets.  There are many things that can diminish the sound quality rendering comparisons meaningless, but improved SQ can only be explained by superior components if that is the variable. IMHO

 

[spritzer]

Quote:

That is an interesting statement, because  I found the same thing with my 009s and 007t/ii amp.
I was really surprised because it's against all reason, but I have the same high quality ICs in both XLR and RCA versions, and the XLRs were more fatiguing than
the RCAs, and the RCAs sound better. 
(This is from the same CDP, and everything else is the same.)
I thought I was imagining things, but repeated A/B tests confirm it.
 
(With my dynamic amps, the XLR route is better, more defined.)

 
Two possible reasons for this, the small switch on the back isn't set to XLR so the - part is grounded.  Another explanation would be with the source which has a single ended output only and then uses something like the DRV134 crap to generate the differential output. 
 
This is assuming you altered the volume level when switching as the output level is probably not identical. 

 

[rgs9200m]

Quote:

 
Two possible reasons for this, the small switch on the back isn't set to XLR so the - part is grounded.  Another explanation would be with the source which has a single ended output only and then uses something like the DRV134 crap to generate the differential output. 
 
This is assuming you altered the volume level when switching as the output level is probably not identical. 

I think the switch is just on the 727, not on the 007t/ii .