[Audiophiliac]

• Some may be ‘mid-fi’ in price, but with the Audiolab 6000CDT and Mojo Audio Mystique DAC (newly upgraded by designer Ben Zwickel) as the source, all of it sounds ‘top-flight’!
• I do not see the gear collection as having redundancy. The tube h/p/a are OTC, OTL, with SS rectification, with tube rectification; the Grados and ZMFs within their lineage have some sonic overlap not convergence.
• So, I do not wonder …

Understood, and I was already hoping not to sound rude about personal preferences. I upgraded my dac from a $300 one to a $2400 one, and I know what you mean about a source making all of your gear sound 'top-flight'. Your Mojo dac should be really good, if it's worth the price.
Nonetheless, personally, with my $2400 dac and WA6SE, I'm wondering if the 6 is my new weakest link. I'm always being told that I'm missing out not having a balanced amp after my dac, so I wonder if I should be asking what could beat a WA22 in that price range.
What do you guys think is a good dac : amp price ratio? Should they be similar in price? I know, everyone is also looking for the price winner that beats all the more expensive stuff too.

 

[jonathan c]

Understood, and I was already hoping not to sound rude about personal preferences. I upgraded my dac from a $300 one to a $2400 one, and I know what you mean about a source making all of your gear sound 'top-flight'. Your Mojo dac should be really good, if it's worth the price.
Nonetheless, personally, with my $2400 dac and WA6SE, I'm wondering if the 6 is my new weakest link. I'm always being told that I'm missing out not having a balanced amp after my dac, so I wonder if I should be asking what could beat a WA22 in that price range.
What do you guys think is a good dac : amp price ratio? Should they be similar in price? I know, everyone is also looking for the price winner that beats all the more expensive stuff too.

I’ll just say that the Mojo Audio Mystique DAC [nos / R2R] is by far my most expensive piece of audio gear (five figures). It is my terminal DAC !!

 

[phoneslave86]

Understood, and I was already hoping not to sound rude about personal preferences. I upgraded my dac from a $300 one to a $2400 one, and I know what you mean about a source making all of your gear sound 'top-flight'. Your Mojo dac should be really good, if it's worth the price.
Nonetheless, personally, with my $2400 dac and WA6SE, I'm wondering if the 6 is my new weakest link. I'm always being told that I'm missing out not having a balanced amp after my dac, so I wonder if I should be asking what could beat a WA22 in that price range.
What do you guys think is a good dac : amp price ratio? Should they be similar in price? I know, everyone is also looking for the price winner that beats all the more expensive stuff too.

I'm not so experienced but the Pegasus is supposed to be as good as some more expensive DACs. The scaling with the WA6 SE seems endless so far. You definitely will get what you put into it if you go all out. It's hard to justify a big tube amp if your system is 10k or under from what I can tell. I think the WA6 SE is fine up to the 15k range of a system. I'm about to upgrade my ethernet and USB for the 4th time because every time I do it just gets better. I'm still trying to reduce even more noise after already doing many noise reductions. It just always improves.

One can expect to spend more on the tube amp itself than its initial cost if they want to push it to the max. That's why big tube amps are so exorbitantly more expensive than something like the WA6 because tubes alone are very expensive at that point. It's nice only having to buy one rectifier.

My U52 is holding up nicely sounds as crisp as when it was first broken in. Really enjoying mesh EML 5U4G a new addition to the stable (tallest tube yet). I'm revisiting Mullard 5V4G tonight and just wow... never heard it sound so good before for sure. It's still getting better.

 

[Audiophiliac]

I'm not so experienced but the Pegasus is supposed to be as good as some more expensive DACs. The scaling with the WA6 SE seems endless so far. You definitely will get what you put into it if you go all out. It's hard to justify a big tube amp if your system is 10k or under from what I can tell. I think the WA6 SE is fine up to the 15k range of a system. I'm about to upgrade my ethernet and USB for the 4th time because every time I do it just gets better. I'm still trying to reduce even more noise after already doing many noise reductions. It just always improves.

One can expect to spend more on the tube amp itself than its initial cost if they want to push it to the max. That's why big tube amps are so exorbitantly more expensive than something like the WA6 because tubes alone are very expensive at that point. It's nice only having to buy one rectifier.

My U52 is holding up nicely sounds as crisp as when it was first broken in. Really enjoying mesh EML 5U4G a new addition to the stable (tallest tube yet). I'm revisiting Mullard 5V4G tonight and just wow... never heard it sound so good before for sure. It's still getting better.

I don't mind hearing that you think my 6SE should be ok with a $2400 DAC, but everyone who's balanced keep on saying balanced is the thing to be.
Could I ask what USB cable you are using now? I got the Audioquest Cinnamon, but for some reason was wearied of listening for what's new, there had been a lot of changes right before.

 

[jonathan c]

Understood, and I was already hoping not to sound rude about personal preferences. I upgraded my dac from a $300 one to a $2400 one, and I know what you mean about a source making all of your gear sound 'top-flight'. Your Mojo dac should be really good, if it's worth the price.

• Mojo Audio Mystique - especially with its newly installed silver WBT RCA outs, treated inner insulation, nano-crystal chokes - is excellent regardless of price.

Nonetheless, personally, with my $2400 dac and WA6SE, I'm wondering if the 6 is my new weakest link. I'm always being told that I'm missing out not having a balanced amp after my dac, so I wonder if I should be asking what could beat a WA22 in that price range.

• WA6SE might be a new weak link: you are limited to 13DE7 / 13DR7 / 13EM7 / 13FD7 tubes for drivers. However, a fuse upgrade (to Audio Magic M-1 or SR Purple) + use of a strong testing NOS Mullard GZ34 will ratchet WA6SE up quite a few notches.
• As for ‘balanced’, that characteristic is not a guarantee of superior h/p/a performance. There are only a few ‘balanced’ tube h/p/a out there.

What do you guys think is a good dac : amp price ratio? Should they be similar in price? I know, everyone is also looking for the price winner that beats all the more expensive stuff too.

I have neither thought about nor used DAC / HPA ‘price ratio’ in putting together my headphone audio system(s). I went for the best source possible; the ‘downstream’ components were then addressed.

 

[phoneslave86]

I don't mind hearing that you think my 6SE should be ok with a $2400 DAC, but everyone who's balanced keep on saying balanced is the thing to be.
Could I ask what USB cable you are using now? I got the Audioquest Cinnamon, but for some reason was wearied of listening for what's new, there had been a lot of changes right before.

My first USB upgrade from a regular cable was an AQ Pearl, then a Supra Excalibur, then an IceAge Cryo copper USB. I swap them all out and the sound differences are just massive at this point. Same thing with I2s and ethernet cables. I'm going to try a Sablon 2020 USB very soon. I'm swapping 2/3 of my Supra Cat 8+ ethernet to Furutech Lan-8 NCF and Sablon 2020. These 32 Ohm 114 Db Beryllium headphones just show me everything (including noise if it's there). I use 2x Lan silencers 1 going into streamer and one into the switch and removing them noise also increases inside of the system.

It will be fatiguing doing changes and breaking in tubes is fatiguing with revealing headphones for sure!! If you have a "rolled off" headphone like a HD650 better choice then Good idea to just listen to something else like a DAP while breaking in.

RCA can sound so good but it does take much work if you have noise and interference, more difficult than fixing it with XLR. I came from using Jot 2 XLR and I was able to avoid fixing my noise problems and get by like that in this noisy room. The Woo with RCA forced me to fix the noise/interference. Now even my Jot 2 sounds better with XLR than it ever did and I found it also had quite a bit of noise using XLR so XLR isn't the cure but it does help and make it easier to deal with. One can also ground their equipment and RCA loops. I grounded my RCA loops.

Getting a nice 6.35 mm headphone cable helps too and makes me feel better not using XLR. (even a nice unbalanced cable still drops the noise and stabilizes the sound out even more which reminds me of XLR) OCC copper + gold has been even better than copper or silver for me so far using more raised headphones.

 

[Barnstormer13]

Understood, and I was already hoping not to sound rude about personal preferences. I upgraded my dac from a $300 one to a $2400 one, and I know what you mean about a source making all of your gear sound 'top-flight'. Your Mojo dac should be really good, if it's worth the price.
Nonetheless, personally, with my $2400 dac and WA6SE, I'm wondering if the 6 is my new weakest link. I'm always being told that I'm missing out not having a balanced amp after my dac, so I wonder if I should be asking what could beat a WA22 in that price range.
What do you guys think is a good dac : amp price ratio? Should they be similar in price? I know, everyone is also looking for the price winner that beats all the more expensive stuff too.

I think you’re at that point where gear synergies really start to matter. More expensive may not necessarily be better, depending on your phones, your amp, your source and your tastes. Your WA22 may be the perfect amp for your headphones or it may be less than ideal. You might spend a lot on a top of the line SS amp and just prefer the sound of tubes.

 

[phoneslave86]

Wow yall. I just got the new IceAge OFC series amp cable broken in and tested for the first time yesterday. My WA6-SE is running much faster and more precisely than I could have imagined was possible beyond the $130 cryo treated IceAge cable I had which was worth every penny. Rick from IceAge has been hand making cables for tube amplifiers for a very long time and knows what he's doing. This cable truly has some kind of endgame special sauce in it and it cost $269 on special for a 5' cable.

 

[RobertSM]

Wow yall. I just got the new IceAge OFC series amp cable broken in and tested for the first time yesterday. My WA6-SE is running much faster and more precisely than I could have imagined was possible beyond the $130 cryo treated IceAge cable I had which was worth every penny. Rick from IceAge has been hand making cables for tube amplifiers for a very long time and knows what he's doing. This cable truly has some kind of endgame special sauce in it and it cost $269 on special for a 5' cable.

Congratulations! As you know a high quality cable can really allow a given piece of equipment to realize it's full potential. Enjoy.

 

[jonathan c]

@phoneslave86 : if you haven't already, complement your IceAge power cable with either SR Purple or Audio Magic M-1 fuse in WA6SE. Size: T(imed), 3.15A(mperes), 5x20mm.

 

[Audiophiliac]

Wow yall. I just got the new IceAge OFC series amp cable broken in and tested for the first time yesterday. My WA6-SE is running much faster and more precisely than I could have imagined was possible beyond the $130 cryo treated IceAge cable I had which was worth every penny. Rick from IceAge has been hand making cables for tube amplifiers for a very long time and knows what he's doing. This cable truly has some kind of endgame special sauce in it and it cost $269 on special for a 5' cable.

Yeah, good find. My much improved new rca cable is sickeningly better while still only at that cables point, but yeah, that's what it needed.

 

[phoneslave86]

@phoneslave86 : if you haven't already, complement your IceAge power cable with either SR Purple or Audio Magic M-1 fuse in WA6SE. Size: T(imed), 3.15A(mperes), 5x20mm.

Oh yea I am a big fan of the purple fuses. I put one in there a while ago, it's very good in there for sure.

Thanks yall, it's been very enjoyable.

 

[Audiophiliac]

You guys are too going to be dead if you think people are going to care about a $400 fuse when it's not even sex.

 

[corbin1]

Does anyone know if this adapter 12A#7 —> 6DE7 is still available somewhere to use with the Gen 1 SE? I checked the Ebay seller Xuling Audio Labs and I don't see where he still lists them? Thanks

 

[jonathan c]

Does anyone know if this adapter 12A#7 —> 6DE7 is still available somewhere to use with the Gen 1 SE? I checked the Ebay seller Xuling Audio Labs and I don't see where he still lists them? Thanks

Here it is. The key phrase is "instead 6DE7". The seller is 'xulingmrs' !!