[strider1007]

Hey!

Now it makes more sens! Thank you that you clarified this for me!

I fiddled back then on my Burson Audio Conductor 3REF with the filters, but I did not noticed any kind of change, right now I am using on MP_SLOW, but I definitely will give a try to it again.

As it seems, I will receive it when I am working, so if I put it together where I work, and I turn it on to warm-up a little, is this a good or bad idea?
So I won't gonna damage the amp or the tubes if I turn it on, and like a min later I will start to listen music or play games? Is that right? I have some experience with the warm-up period, back then, when I ordered my Conductor with the S6 opamps, after 250 hours the sound started to feel much more "alive" and "precise" for me.

Thank you! I already looked after the rectifiers, I just wanted to be sure if I can screw it up, or no!

I already checked that thread, and I do think, maybe I can get a western electric 422 or Mullard, but I need some time to figure it out

Just make sure you have headphones plugged in before you fire it up, WOO is very clear about that.
Turning on the amp without headphones plugged in can cause serious damage..

Apart from that, the first burn-in might be a couple of days. Two or three hours won't make that much of a difference. When I got my WA 6SE 2nd gen I played radio for three days 24/7, before I did some serious listening. And even after that I think I heard differences the first few days. And that all starts over when you try new tubes, lots of fun !

I also bought a pair of 13EM7, with the adapters. Like @cebuboy said, much more gain. Using my QUAD ERA-1 headphones I could not go beyond 9 o'clock on the volume pot without it being too loud. I bought a set of -15 dB Rothwell attenuaters, and now I can use the volume control up to 12 o'clock and even a little further.

All in all, you're in for a nice ride !

 

[kebcy]

Just make sure you have headphones plugged in before you fire it up, WOO is very clear about that.
Turning on the amp without headphones plugged in can cause serious damage..

Apart from that, the first burn-in might be a couple of days. Two or three hours won't make that much of a difference. When I got my WA 6SE 2nd gen I played radio for three days 24/7, before I did some serious listening. And even after that I think I heard differences the first few days. And that all starts over when you try new tubes, lots of fun !

I also bought a pair of 13EM7, with the adapters. Like @cebuboy said, much more gain. Using my QUAD ERA-1 headphones I could not go beyond 9 o'clock on the volume pot without it being too loud. I bought a set of -15 dB Rothwell attenuaters, and now I can use the volume control up to 12 o'clock and even a little further.

All in all, you're in for a nice ride !

Just got a mail and SMS from DPD, that tomorrow (probably) they will deliver the WA6SE to me, so I am happy!

Yep, I read that on several forums, that before I fire it up, the headphone cable should be connected.

Well as I read after 8 hours of music session, the amp should be shut down, and let them cool down. So this is not "legit" as well? Mainly I listen music 4-8 hour on a daily basis.

I will post some pic, when I get my hands on it!!

 

[senseitedj]

Just got a mail and SMS from DPD, that tomorrow (probably) they will deliver the WA6SE to me, so I am happy!

Yep, I read that on several forums, that before I fire it up, the headphone cable should be connected.

Well as I read after 8 hours of music session, the amp should be shut down, and let them cool down. So this is not "legit" as well? Mainly I listen music 4-8 hour on a daily basis.

I will post some pic, when I get my hands on it!!

Congrats! you wont regret it. I certainly didn't! This is my first proper tube amp and its characteristic sound signature is quite amazing

That is correct, let the amp cooldown for 1 hr after 8 hrs use.

note, tubes don't sound at their prime until 50+ hrs of burn in.

 

[kebcy]

First impressions :

This is a whole different feeling instead of a "simple opamp", tho if we call the Conductor 3REF as a "simple" opamp dac/amp external soundcard.

Hard to describe the feeling changing from opamps to tubes. For me the soundstage is much more wider, as I feel a lot of background voice came forward, meanwhile the vocal and the bass remain the same. The soundstage is like.. hard to find words to describe, it's like I stepped into a room, where only the music and myself be, and nothing else, also the "position" of myself, in the music changed as well, like.. I became the center of the music, and it's not like that I am listening the song from the 3rd or 6th row, or something like this.

I use Tidal, of course master, and I can definitely tell, that I hear much more instruments than before, like little "strings" and other background voices. I have a pretty good "monitor" (tho youtube..) music to this, but on a master quality music, literally incredible.
Vocals are on point for me, of course every music what I listen is a bit different, but recalling from yesterday, it's like.. i don't know. A whole different page. Some vocal became even more cleaner and came way forward (Michael Oakley - Babylon or Rabbit in the Moonlight) and some became much more intense and more emotion filled (Holding Absence - Peris or Holding Absence Gravity) so it's really hard to describe these things. Of course none of our fingers are similar to each other so our ears are on the same page too, but before I turned it on, I told myself, I won't gonna sit onto the hypetrain, it's still a non-warmed up tube, also my ears have to get used to this feeling, but for the very very first impression, the change is not mind-blowing, but it is very close to it, at least for me.

One negativity :
Unfortunately some kind of EIM happens in my PC, so when the music stops, and literally I am only just browsing, I hear my mouse moving on my desk, also scrolling, so somewhere I have interference but I did not had time to investigate the problem. I turned off the Intel SpeedStep technology, but this did not fixed the problem unfortunately.

TL;DR
Tube Amps is a whole different page in the amplifiers book.

 

[Astral Abyss]

One negativity :
Unfortunately some kind of EIM happens in my PC, so when the music stops, and literally I am only just browsing, I hear my mouse moving on my desk, also scrolling, so somewhere I have interference but I did not had time to investigate the problem. I turned off the Intel SpeedStep technology, but this did not fixed the problem unfortunately

Is your mouse wireless? If so, the receiver is generating interference. Same thing will happen if you put your phone too close to the amp when it transmits data.

 

[kebcy]

Is your mouse wireless? If so, the receiver is generating interference. Same thing will happen if you put your phone too close to the amp when it transmits data.

I do have (some) wireless, but right now I am using only my wired mouse. When I finish my listening session, I will plug the mouse into a different USB slot. Maybe the grounding is somewhere faulty, or my mobo already giving himself, which I hope won't gonna happen..

 

[kebcy]

First impressions :

This is a whole different feeling instead of a "simple opamp", tho if we call the Conductor 3REF as a "simple" opamp dac/amp external soundcard.

Hard to describe the feeling changing from opamps to tubes. For me the soundstage is much more wider, as I feel a lot of background voice came forward, meanwhile the vocal and the bass remain the same. The soundstage is like.. hard to find words to describe, it's like I stepped into a room, where only the music and myself be, and nothing else, also the "position" of myself, in the music changed as well, like.. I became the center of the music, and it's not like that I am listening the song from the 3rd or 6th row, or something like this.

I use Tidal, of course master, and I can definitely tell, that I hear much more instruments than before, like little "strings" and other background voices. I have a pretty good "monitor" (tho youtube..) music to this, but on a master quality music, literally incredible.
Vocals are on point for me, of course every music what I listen is a bit different, but recalling from yesterday, it's like.. i don't know. A whole different page. Some vocal became even more cleaner and came way forward (Michael Oakley - Babylon or Rabbit in the Moonlight) and some became much more intense and more emotion filled (Holding Absence - Peris or Holding Absence Gravity) so it's really hard to describe these things. Of course none of our fingers are similar to each other so our ears are on the same page too, but before I turned it on, I told myself, I won't gonna sit onto the hypetrain, it's still a non-warmed up tube, also my ears have to get used to this feeling, but for the very very first impression, the change is not mind-blowing, but it is very close to it, at least for me.

One negativity :
Unfortunately some kind of EIM happens in my PC, so when the music stops, and literally I am only just browsing, I hear my mouse moving on my desk, also scrolling, so somewhere I have interference but I did not had time to investigate the problem. I turned off the Intel SpeedStep technology, but this did not fixed the problem unfortunately.

TL;DR
Tube Amps is a whole different page in the amplifiers book.

I found a pretty relevant webshop in here, Hungary which sells some very rare tube/rectifiers, if anyone interested, take a look :

http://www.elektroncso.hu/lista.php#a

I also wanna ask in this section any good rectifiers? (Except the Sylvania 5U4G and DJ4)

 

[cebuboy]

The Soviet 5U3C black plate sounds good to me, they are not that expensive compared to the popular rectifiers.

 

[Contrails]

Depends on the genre you listen to. The Sophia mesh 274B plays well with rock, electronic and hip-hop. Brimar 5r4gy for Vocals/mid centric stuff. Both are reasonable in comparison to USAF 596/WE 422A/GZ34 metal base.

 

[senseitedj]

Depends on the genre you listen to. The Sophia mesh 274B plays well with rock, electronic and hip-hop. Brimar 5r4gy for Vocals/mid centric stuff. Both are reasonable in comparison to USAF 596/WE 422A/GZ34 metal base.

I agree.

I also would like to add the RCA 5U4GB is also pretty decent for a more neutral, fast sounding, with decent soundstage sounding tube for a low cost. This could be had for 40 GBP in UK money. I purchased mine from Watford Valves.

cant wait until Brimar 5R4GY arrives and burned it.

 

[Contrails]

Just plugged in a RCA 5u4gb. Very good tube indeed. Neutral and fast for sure.

edit: I am really enjoying the RCA with Sly 13DR7 drivers.

 

[Zachik]

Thinking of selling my WA6... My unit is exactly 3 years old, but has probably less than 50 hours on it!!
So, practically brand new unit. I know, I know, too many toys and too little time.
Giving the folks on this thread first chance before listing on the classifieds.
My WA6 is a Gen 1, since I believe the Gen 1 tubes were better than Gen 2 (12V) tubes. In fact, Woo Audio (I bought from them directly) converted a new Gen 2 to Gen 1 before shipping it to me!
Also, I paid extra $125 for adding a pass-through RCA (so I can daisy-chain another amp to my DAC).
Black color, looks and practically IS brand new
PM me with questions / offers...

Great amp, but got several higher-end amps so the WA6 never gets out of its original box! Need a better home (to fund new toys)

 

[Contrails]

damn… I just got a new DAC and the WA6SE decides to hum through the headphones. The DAC is silent through the stereo amp. The hum got reduced when I changed from the RCA 5r4gy rectifier to Sophia 274B mesh but it’s still there. It seems to go away once the music plays but as soon as I pause - it’s there. I have changed power cables, sockets, tried different RCA cables…

 

[senseitedj]

damn… I just got a new DAC and the WA6SE decides to hum through the headphones. The DAC is silent through the stereo amp. The hum got reduced when I changed from the RCA 5r4gy rectifier to Sophia 274B mesh but it’s still there. It seems to go away once the music plays but as soon as I pause - it’s there. I have changed power cables, sockets, tried different RCA cables…

Nice,

How does the RCA 5RGY compare to Sophia 274B in general? Since I read they are both neutral-ish in the sound signature.

 

[Contrails]

@senseitedj The Sophia just has a little more bass. The RCA is more neutral. And a bargain. The Sophia looks pretty. It’s a party tube. Because the bass is a bit emphasised in comparison - the RCA seems to be faster as the RCA bass is more neutral. The differences are very small.
Sophia for pop, hip-hop, edm, rock and Jazz
RCA - jazz, vocals, classical, acoustic.