[Dept_of_Alchemy]

Quote:

Originally Posted by oofie810 /img/forum/go_quote.gif In that case, which tubes from the ef91 family is recommended? I only have the stock and the Russian tubes for my mkIII.

My favorite would be the Mullard M8083 Mullard M8083 / CV4014 Mil. Spec. Little Dot Amp EF91 - eBay (item 270278941582 end time Dec-21-08 16:53:02 PST)

 

[raekwonse]

Wow, I just popped in my Mullard M8161's that I received in the mail and omg...the soundstage is ridiculous. I've been through the stock driver tubes, the M8100s, and the Voshod military spec tubes. They were decent, but this is by far the best out of all of them.

I think I'm in heaven.

 

[Pricklely Peete]

Quote:

Originally Posted by SemiAudiophile /img/forum/go_quote.gif hmm...i'm having a bit of a weird problem. received the amperex 5654 PQ's today, but when i popped them in i'm get this weird feedback. i can hear some static coming from mainly the left channel but sometimes the right too. i play some music through them and it sounds amazing however the feedback is kind of annoying. another thing is when i first turn the amp on, i notice that the left tube glows extremely bright for about a second and then dims back to normal. at first i thought it was the amp, and unscrewed the back and checked inside. but couldn't find or smell anything. then i switched the stock tubes back in and everything was fine. so could it be the tubes that are bad or what?? also just curious, how do you slide out the circuit board? i was trying to figure it out when i took apart the back panel and the top transformer.

Amperex PQ's flash when first fired up. It's normal and nothing to worry about

It's kinda cool I think .....I also have some E95F PQ's ...absolutely incredible tubes SQ wise I found. but rare as hell and hard to find.

Peete.

 

[SemiAudiophile]

hey peete, did you have distortion problems too? i'm getting distortion wherever that flashing tube is placed. i emailed yen about it and he told me it was normal about the flashing too, but he said the distortion is unusual but should go away after about 8-10 hours of burn-in. i asked him if i could get a replacement, but apparently this was his last set.

 

[Pricklely Peete]

Quote:

Originally Posted by SemiAudiophile /img/forum/go_quote.gif hey peete, did you have distortion problems too? i'm getting distortion wherever that flashing tube is placed. i emailed yen about it and he told me it was normal about the flashing too, but he said the distortion is unusual but should go away after about 8-10 hours of burn-in. i asked him if i could get a replacement, but apparently this was his last set.

No distortion problems with my PQ's... but the tubes I have are the same family as the MK III stock driver tubes. I don't have any EF91's at all.

Peete.

 

[Henmyr]

Just read http://www.head-fi.org/forums/f5/que...e-amps-388255/ and came to think about tube-life.

Have anyone of you LD MKIII owners had a tube burn-out yet? This includes both driver and powertubes.

Have anyone of you had a tube break prematurely (buy turning the amp on or of etc.)?

 

[ScottieB]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Henmyr /img/forum/go_quote.gif Just read http://www.head-fi.org/forums/f5/que...e-amps-388255/ and came to think about tube-life. Have anyone of you LD MKIII owners had a tube burn-out yet? This includes both driver and powertubes. Have anyone of you had a tube break prematurely (buy turning the amp on or of etc.)?

Nope. Only had it for about 7 months, but have purchased many NOS tubes andeven all of them have been just fine. I think the lightbulb analogy is the best one - you never know, and they could go at any moment, but usually they work long enough to be considered reasonable.

 

[Lunchbox2]

I just bought a MKIII from the forums here, and I'm really looking forward to checking it out and maybe upgrading the tubes.

 

[eboy2003]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Anavel0 /img/forum/go_quote.gif @ eboy2003 Did you do any other mods to your MK III? Because it definetly doesn't look like mine. Specifically the absense of the 3 Rubycon caps, I also noticed some others do not look the same either. Or maybe it was just an older revision? I know Little Dot did make a couple of changes to the MK III.

No nothing mod yet. My MK III was purchased in Oct 07, I think the internal components vary from batch to batch. The three power caps on my MK III uses Nichicon. The MK III does not use much hifi quality components anyway. It's easy enough to replace all components, but MK III is so tight that the power cap and output cap may only have limited choice.

 

[vintinfinity]

Hi, I'm new to posting on Head-Fi, but a long time reader on occasion over the years.

I am interested in a tube headphone/preamp combo... I have read that some people think the MK III has more potential than the MK IV ( and SE model) with the various tube rolling options.

I want to use it with some HD280 Pros and as a preamp for my component stereo, possibly some open headphones later too.

This thread is overwhelmingly long, so any thoughts on the matter would be helpful.

 

[mudhole]

Originally Posted by SemiAudiophile
i want to run the 6H30 family of power tubes. what kind of resistors do i need? and where to get them? HELP pleeasssee.



I just talked with sword-yang yesterday, he said the new version LD MKIII v2.0 has already changed the resistor from 68ohm to 120ohm. So you can use the 6H30 power tube without doing the resistor mod. Check your PCB version No. first.

 

[esirex]

Another gems to look into Ultron 5654 from Germany really sound nice on guitar especially Metallica. Currently awaiting Mazda EF91

 

[esirex]

The Mazda tubes EF91...when i first plug in the sound sounds good with mid and high but bass was terrible and distorted on my MS2i. So i lowered the gain to the minimum, still minor distortion can be heard. Burnt in for 4 hours distortion gone at low gain but I have to turn my volume up so i decided to up to mid gain damn distortion so plugged in my ER4s gosh no distortion and I hear good sounds from my Ety. Now after nearly 20 hours of burn in I swear I have never hear sounds that was so good on my Ety. Bass is tight mid and highs are sweet. And sound is warm...

 

[One Fan To Another]

I'd like to weigh in about the MKIII mod that allows you to use 6H30Pi tubes.

I did the mod a while back (I believe this thread was on page 50 something at the time) and put in the EH 6H30Pi Gold tubes I had purchased for a pretty high price from Yen Audio (who has the all the great tubes, and THE best customer service, but certainly the harshest prices). Unlike a lot of people in the world I don't suffer from the condition that effects a person brain to believe that the more expensive something is the better it absolutely has to be (MRI scans have shown that in some test subject's brains their brains actually react and the subject's thinking patterns change when given two exact same substances but told that the second substance is the more expensive one - like wine for example - making the subject believe that one tastes better even though it's the same wine). So, back to the tubes I've switched out the stock tubes and am now listening to these new, fancy-shmancy, expensive tubes. On first listen I can straight out say that the stock tubes after decent burn in are better than the brand new, un-used Golds. But of course we have to go by the burned in sound. So, I use the Gold's for quiet a while and believe that they do in fact get better. They seem to become warmer (or "musical", if you will) but in no way add to the sound stage or expand the low or high end. So, even after burn in the Golds, when in came down to it, simply added mild warmth to the amp. For the trouble of the modding (and the chance that you'll burn something out even WITH the mod, as the last few pages of this thread have indicated) and the ridiculous price of the new tubes I can honestly say it is, in absolutely no way worth it. And, I'm not even saying, "If you have the money it might be worth trying". No, I'm saying if you bought an MKIII you'd be straight out wasting you time and money to get 6H30Pi tubes.

Lastly, I CAN say that while the stock tubes may not be as warm as the Golds were the difference in warm is next to negligible and I've found that the sound stage is about that much better on the stock tubes. The switch is basically an equal trade of sound stage for warmth but very, very little anyway. Not to mention the whole unit is cooler with the stock tubes.

Needless to say I put the stock tubes back in and my MKIII is staying this way: Stock power tubes with Sylvania 6AK5 Golds tubes.

 

[One Fan To Another]

Oh, I'd like to add: The best thing I did for my headphone setup was add a BBE Sonic Maximizer. Forget tubes for a second, for less than the price of a couple pairs of EH 6H30Pi tubes you can get a Maximizer off of eBay and get a far superior and much more palpable change in you sound. I can't use my headphone setup without one at this point.