[joseph69]

Sophia dropped by today... I must say, she is quite the eye pleaser, and sounds great too. Plus... the Hum is gone. It must be something to do with the individual tube, matched with the transformer. On the AC side. Current draw, resonance... Something?

Great to hear the hum is gone.
Yeah, I'm not sure why, but I know from my experience with different rectifier tubes the trans will hum.
When you get the chance buy yourself a Brimar 5Z4GY...inexpensive and you'll probably prefer it over the SP.

 

[Ron Sherwood]

Woof! Very nice.

How does it all sound?

 

[twitch133]

Great to hear the hum is gone.
Yeah, I'm not sure why, but I know from my experience with different rectifier tubes the trans will hum.
When you get the chance buy yourself a Brimar 5Z4GY...inexpensive and you'll probably prefer it over the SP.

Yeah man, Kind of interesting. The only thing that I can come up with is the 5U4GB was drawing a little bit more current off of the AC side? On that note though, the SE 274B seems to have taken a little bit of gain off of the amp... But, may be confirmation bias (it is kind of hard to A/B tubes.) It seems to have tightened the bass up, and taken a little bit more the that SSSSSS'y, siblant edge off the highs.

I really love it when they can tame the highs like that. Due to years in the oilfield, working crew boat engine rooms. I already have issues with tinnitus, and ringing highs give me a headache.

I'll have to look into that one, I have already found a few on ebay, lol. But, I am planning on working on a collection of tubes to roll at will. (That AF 596 looks sexy, but I have a hard time stomaching 450 for a tube that I doubt would offer much improvement... It looks really

Woof! Very nice.

How does it all sound?

I am really happy with it. The new tube got in at about noon... it is now about 9, and I probably have 7.5 hours on it already, lol.

I have been going through most of my music with it. I find that the warmth that it brings to Orchestra is excellent (I replayed "This is Me, covered by "The Brooklyn Duo" at least 8 or 9 times). And, it tames the really annoying treble and cymbals in the 700's and 80's punk that I grew up on, but, it is really allowing me to see how truly bad the masters were from that genre and era.

 

[Henley2]

Just sold my Woo Audio Wa6 SE. Still doubting whether to go for a WA5 or Cavalli Audio Liquid Gold. I use them with HD 800s. Any opinions?

 

[pippen99]

Get both! I did.

Just sold my Woo Audio Wa6 SE. Still doubting whether to go for a WA5 or Cavalli Audio Liquid Gold. I use them with HD 800s. Any opinions?

 

[musicman59]

If you have the money to spend on both then I would buy none and buy the WA33... I used to one a WA5LE and I am very familiar with the LG. IMO the WA33 is better than both.
I am putting a plan together to try to go for the WA33 Elite Edition. I tried it with the HD800 and Utopia. I have never heard those headphones sounding that good (I own both).

 

[pippen99]

Would that I had seen the WA33 coming two years ago when I purchased both. Ours is a limited market and I would need to sell both for a reasonable return to afford a WA33 Elite. I have not heard a WA33 but would be willing to buy on faith considering my experience with the WA5.

 

[Ron Sherwood]

After much research, head scratching,spousal negotiations, I have ordered a new WA7,2nd Gen.

Woo was very responsive and patient with my questions and have impressed me with their service, so far.

WOO, HOO!

 

[KEV G]

Hi, I'm really new to the valve/tube world, recently bought the Valhalla 2 and i'm liking what I'm hearing so thought I may go a little deeper in. I've seen a WA2 for sale for £550, wondering if thats a fair price, just waiting for the person to get back to me with how old it is and how many hours its done. Its had the $200 valve/tube upgrade also and he says its in excellent condition. Sorry if this info is somewhere in this thread, as I've just found it and there are quite a few posts on here. Rest assured, if I end up with the WA2 I'll be reading all the way start to finish. Any info/advice will be much appreciated, thanks

 

[thecrow]

Hi, I'm really new to the valve/tube world, recently bought the Valhalla 2 and i'm liking what I'm hearing so thought I may go a little deeper in. I've seen a WA2 for sale for £550, wondering if thats a fair price, just waiting for the person to get back to me with how old it is and how many hours its done. Its had the $200 valve/tube upgrade also and he says its in excellent condition. Sorry if this info is somewhere in this thread, as I've just found it and there are quite a few posts on here. Rest assured, if I end up with the WA2 I'll be reading all the way start to finish. Any info/advice will be much appreciated, thanks

I have the wa2 and i lovr it. Its silky smooth. Great detail. Fantastic with my hd800.
So as per OTL amps you will be pretty much limited to higher impedance headphones.

My lcd2s work pretty well, not ideal though.

If it’s the same liating i saw the $200 tube upgrade is not a big upgrade so if you are looking for better upgrades it will cost you more (i don’t regret that at all) and the aound will vastly improve further and most of the upgrade tubes in that liating may end up being superfluous

My 2 cents

So in a nutshell ignore the upgraded tubes in the sale and only look at if you are wanting an amp for high impedance headphones. I won’t sell mine as long as i have my hd800....which i cant see myself selling either

 

[iPaintCode]

I've been eyeing the recently updated WA22 in Black or a WA6SE 2nd Gen from Woo Audio but not sure I want to buy balanced cables for the headphones I have now, could get pricey. I sold my silver WA7+TP combo last year and picked up a 2nd Gen WA7+TP this year and feels good to be back in the Woo Audio game, though I've been using my Chord Hugo 2 as DAC. I did upgrade the Power/Driver tubes: EHX Gold Pin from WA and been tube rolling with the WA7TP with 3 different sets. I wish they used a tube on the WA7 that had as many options as the TP has but you can't beat the form factors of the WA7/8.

 

[KEV G]

Hi fellas, regarding the WA2, the guy just got back to me and said it is 7 years old but only 10 hours run time. 7 years seems quite old to me, but on the other hand my Talk Electronics HiFi Amps are about 15 years old and still sound amazing. Being new to this world of valves/tubes I’m unsure of the lifespan of these amps. There doesn’t seem to be many of these amps for sale in the used ads, I’m thinking they’re that good that people tend to just keep em. Any thoughts would be once again greatly appreciated. Thanks

 

[Csericks]

My WA2 is 6 or 7 years old, may have an average of about 10 hours per week and I have no thoughts of selling!

 

[KEV G]

My WA2 is 6 or 7 years old, may have an average of about 10 hours per week and I have no thoughts of selling!

Oh man, I’m so close to hitting the button,£550.00 seems like a really fair deal. So if I hit the button, I’ve got a lot of catching up to do on this thread thanks for all your advice

 

[audioadvocate]

Hello fellow Woo-owners,

I bought the WA22 a few months ago for use with my HD800s headphones. This amp/headphone combination provides an aurally-holographic experience with great recordings. I spend lots of time with classical music, which is a potent "tool" to evaluate the quality of electronics. The 1st generation WA22 with the HD800s headphones would literally recreate the actual location of instruments in a full, 88-piece orchestra. Very few non-classical recordings are so dependant upon width and depth of soundstage. Solo jazz singers with just a few instruments on some older Chesky recordings allow for recreation of instrument positions in that soundstage, and allow for the "air" in recordings that has been talked about in "underground" audiophile journals like The Absolute Sound or Stereophile. But if you want to experience the resolving power of this equipment, you need to use simple stereo or binaural mic techniques and avoid close-miked recordings.

My CD collection dates back to 1983. I have listened to thousands of classical recordings over the years. Many early releases were "close-miked" disasters, as it took recording engineers decades to "get it right." But there are a few exceptions. One recording that comes to mind the will reveal the resolving power of the WA22/HD800s combination is an early, 1984 DDD rendition of Rimsky-Korsakov's Scheherezade, conducted by Charles Dutoit and the Montreal Symphony Orchestra (London/Decca/Polygram 410 253-2). The violin solo sections and the ability of these components to handle massed strings, depth, and air is extraordinary. This is an album that will cause goosebumps.

If you can get a copy of this CD, do it. You will be amazed at the clarity and 3-dimensional nature of the recording, and because the recording is so well-done, you will hear just how good the WA22 (1st Generation) is.

Woo Audio obviously felt that there was always room for improvement with the release of the WA22 (2nd. gen) amplifier. I emailed Woo about whether they were offering upgrades for 1st generation owners, and they are not. Apparently, because of the extensive point-to-point wiring in the WA22, an upgrade is not feasible and wouldn't be a good business decision. I wonder if, from a sonic point of view, whether there would be much of a difference between the two amps. Time and further reviews will tell.

My associated equipment:

OPPO UDP-205 Blu-Ray/CD player/Dual ES9038PRO DACs
Straightwire Rhapsody Balanced Interconnects
Sennheiser HD800s headphones/4-pinXLR cable
Sennheiser HD6XX via Massdrop
Archlinux computer/JRIVER media center 24 via USB/TOSLINK Optical outputs

At one point, I lived with the NAD M51 DAC for a month prior to receiving my OPPO UDP-205. Both DACs are excellent with very subtle differences, but the holographic nature of the WA22/HD800s combo did not change and is extraordinary with either DAC.

The tubes I have in my WA22 are:
Sophia Princess 274B
Matched pair NOS Sylvania 6SN7 driver tubes (circa 1954)
Matched pair NOS Tung Sol 7236 power tubes (circa 1950-60 era)

(The amp originally was supplied with a no-name Chinese rectifier tube and Phillips JAN6080WC power tubes. Changing these out to the current tube configuration just made things better.)

Good listening!