[GamingDay]

My Drop x xDuoo TA-84 just shipped, so soon i’ll let ya’ll know how it stacks up. I have a bunch of tubes to roll in it too.

How do they sound compared to the TA-26s? I'm not sure which I should get.

 

[Nightelf]

More energy
What do you want to do with it? Plans to heat up your place, you should buy a heater.
No problems to drive my HE-6 and it sounds great.
With Psvane or Siemens tubes.

I have Senn HD58X, and plan buy Hifiman XS.
How volume control work on Xduoo TA20 plus? It is momentary, or need wait a moment to apply? A bit pity that can't change gain setting.
Xduoo isn't also hot?
Which tube is more important in sound modeling 2AU7 or 5Z4P?

 

[grant0317]

I had heard that the Mullard tubes were bright and grainy, so I avoided getting a matched pair. Sounds like that was bad info. Thank you for clearing that up.

Actually mullards are known for being warm and smooth. You can refer to this img for more info from another head-fier.

 

[grant0317]

I have Senn HD58X, and plan buy Hifiman XS.
How volume control work on Xduoo TA20 plus? It is momentary, or need wait a moment to apply? A bit pity that can't change gain setting.
Xduoo isn't also hot?
Which tube is more important in sound modeling 2AU7 or 5Z4P?

Volume control on the ta 20 plus has 100 steps from 0-99. It works just like any other topping/smsl product (the volume reacts instantly to your turning of the knob, though in my case I just set it to a constant 60 and change the volume using my e70 as a preamp). The Xduoo doesn't get hot, only warm. I use the cage (it also acts as a faraday cage to isolate rf) and if i touch the top of the transformer or the cage or any other part of the amp that's not the tubes, it feels nice and toasty, just warm sort of like a small hand warmer not hot. The 5z4p is the rectifier (very limited change) so the pair of 12au7 tubes are the ones to roll and will have a greater impact.

The amp has a very full sound with lots of body to the music with my lcd2 and verite closed. Would not recommend pairing with ndh 20 upon limited impressions. Treble is rounded out nicely as expected of class a and tube hybrid. Because it's a hybrid it won't lose much details compared to straight up ss, and vs my topping l70, I definitely prefer the xduoo ta 20 plus as it has more punch and smoothness to the sound. Tube rolling to mullards made the bass have better impact. Mids are not super thick and lush, but smooth and warm. Overall very good clarity and detail. I think comparisons have to be made against specific ss amps rather than in general, as this amp will sound very different from a neutral sound amp like gustard h16, but less different to a l70, and rather similar to s17 pro.

Stock tubes definitely are not that good, and has no name, only the xduoo logo on them. It takes roughly 3-5 min to fully warm up for operation and I sort of just keep it turned on until I'm done or after 6 hours. It won't quite match up against higher tier ss amps like ferrum oor or xi audio formula S, but for $500 very good amp I would say. With the discontinuation of the Liquid platinum, the only similar competitor would be schiit lyr, and the next tier amp above those two would be the feliks echo for $1000/1100. I tend to veer away from schiit products mainly due to them being located in CA, and being in Korea it's just not feasible for me to deal with any shipping things for warranty vs shipping to my local xduoo dealer.

 

[tommo21]

I have TA20 Plus, TA 26S and Aune S17 Pro. I have to say they aren't that different. I have a good tube stash with both expensive and cheap tubes for the Xduoo's and changing tubes is not night and day. If I would compare it to an EQ....1db + or - here and there at most. Just subtle differences. TA26s has the most forward mids, but lack a little both in trebleextension and basscontrol. TA20 Plus is very good and is more neutral than TA26s. It's almost SS like with a little mid focus. Aune S17 Pro is the most tubey sounding SS I have ever heard. For me I prefer the Aune at 50 MA and not 100Ma setting. 100MA setting gets too much tubey for me and a narrow sound stage which is much wider at 50ma.

My recommendation If you only get one of these....TA20 plus.

 

[El nai del vent]

My xduoo mt-604 has some contact problem, it is slight. Would a non-audiophile overlook it? Sure. It's in the left channel that depending on how you move the 4.4 and xlr output, you lose some prequencies. It also happens if you move the valves slightly.

This drove me crazy to the point that I changed all the xlr and 4.4 connectors. I found out that it works perfectly and does not give that problem when it works without the metal case. Maybe the board makes some kind of contact. My question is: how dangerous is it to use this amplifier without the case?


Blessings for your audio system.

 

[El nai del vent]

Question for those of you experienced with both smaller and larger tube amps.

I'm considering upgrading from my MT-602 w/ GE Jan 5654w tubes to the new TA-20 plus. MT-602 puts out 1300 mW and drives both my denon ah-d9200 and hifiman he-1000 stealth wonderfully.

Just wondering if I will get substantial sonic improvement (dynamism, clarity, staging, etc.) or not.

If there is going to be an improvement, you will appreciate the extra power and cleaner amplification, for me it was a substantial change from the xduoo mt 604 to the Ta-20. And it's fun to play with different tubes.

 

[ICrazyJI]

For those of you that had the TA-20, is it worth upgrading to the TA-20 Plus?

 

[stevedlu]

Jesus, Mary, and Joseph! Just tried my TA-22 for the first time. This has to be the best value in headphone audio.

 

[stevedlu]

if u got the time, u wait for TA-32 first, because when i got TA-22, i saw TA-32 and im disappointed lol, but now i pretty happy with it since i used it for quite a while

I actually jumped on the TA-22 to get it before the TA-32 comes out. I'm not a fan of tube rectifiers. In my experience the bass is weaker with tube rectifiers and you have to spend a lot of money on HQ rectifier tubes to get close to what a regular one does.

 

[r3f3r3e]

Jesus, Mary, and Joseph! Just tried my TA-22 for the first time. This has to be the best value in headphone audio.

Nice. Have you changed the stock tubes?

 

[stevedlu]

Nice. Have you changed the stock tubes?

I put the Apos Ray's in a couple of hours ago. They are very impressive so far and still have a few more hours of burning in. Big upgrade from stock already. I also have a set of Gold Lion's waiting to be thrown in. I love tube rolling. My next purchase is going to be NOS RCA Black Plates, RCAs on average are my fav tube in each type. Do you have any recommendations?
I can't get over how much I like the DAC in this thing, I was half expecting to be underwhelmed by the DAC and have to hook up my Chord Mojo 2 or Qutest but I prefer the internal one honestly. Maybe the RCA inputs just suck though. Either way I'm super happy with it.

 

[r3f3r3e]

I put the Apos Ray's in a couple of hours ago. They are very impressive so far and still have a few more hours of burning in. Big upgrade from stock already. I also have a set of Gold Lion's waiting to be thrown in. I love tube rolling. My next purchase is going to be NOS RCA Black Plates, RCAs on average are my fav tube in each type. Do you have any recommendations?
I can't get over how much I like the DAC in this thing, I was half expecting to be underwhelmed by the DAC and have to hook up my Chord Mojo 2 or Qutest but I prefer the internal one honestly. Maybe the RCA inputs just suck though. Either way I'm super happy with it.

Im currently using RCA Clear top which I am very satisfied with. It opens out the sound stage, it sounds more airy. But it has lesser bass but I'm okay with it. I'm using TA-22 with Focal Utopia and the bass hits hard anyway. Now I'm pretty tempted to try out Apos Ray Tubes since I read so many positive reviews about it. Still thinking whether wanna get it.

I have tried electro-harmonix, General electric, Shuguang, but I still prefer RCA Clear top. Personally I think GE is closer to RCA Clear Top.

Does the Apos Ray open out the sound stage? I like the bigger soundstage from RCA Clear top that I hope Apos Ray has as well.

 

[stevedlu]

I read that about the clear top. I'm not a basshead but that description turned me off a little bit even though I may like it. The bass makes or breaks it with me. I haven't noticed any larger sound stage with the Apos. I actually think the tubes that came with it had very decent sound stage, especially compared to the Gold Lion's after a few hours. I would say the Apos has the same stage as the OEM tubes but the Apos is just very detailed, and balanced while having that little zip of tubey goodness. Very reminiscent of all the best TOTL new tubes. The best new tubes still don't compare imo to the best vintage. I've only hooked up my Focal Clears so far. Still have LCD-3 and LCD-4 to try. Out of the three the gold lion's are the least impressive so far which is bizarre because it's such a well regarded 12AU7. The Gold Lion 6922 is one of my fav tubes of all time. Oh well.

 

[S Crowther]

For those of you that had the TA-20, is it worth upgrading to the TA-20 Plus?

I have both.
The plus is a definite improvement. Worth the cost of the upgrade. Same basic sound presentation but better done. More powerful, lower noise floor, bigger sound stage.