In Reply to: RE: Sony XA7ES posted by mjcmt on September 23, 2009 at 16:24:28:
No offense taken.
My experience was quite the opposite.
I felt the 308 was OK but nothing special. The 308T had a nice full bodied harmonically rich and warm sound to it. I did tube roll it a bit with Mullards and Telefunkens. I thought the Mullards were lacking detail and a little veiled overall (but smooth) while the Telefunkens brought out more detail and transparency. I preferred the Telefunkens.
However, on the 303/300, I tube rolled that thing with a wide variety including some tubes that were sent to me on loan from Asylum inmates. I felt that the 303/300 was quite goo0d on it's solid-state outputs - which bypasses the buffer tubes entirely... it's purely a solid-state CD player at this point.
The tubes in the 303/300 are just buffers while in the 308T they're tapped into the DAC circuit and offer gain which isn't the case with the 303/300.
I felt that the 303/300 tube output was slightly dynamically challenged (a little "muffled"), smooth but slightly veiled no matter what tubes I tossed at it.
I simply felt that the 308T was a significantly better sounding CD player if you're comparing tube output vs tube output between the two models.
I've had 4 Cary players over the years including the 306/300, 308, 308T, and 303/300. I liked the 306/200 best then the 308T. I think the 308T is the real bargain in the bunch especially when you find them used at right around $1000 +/- which is typical.
Inside the Cary 303/300 I once owned (center shield removed):
Close up of op-amp, transistors, and tube buffer stage with stock tubes:
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Follow Ups
- Cary 308T / Cary 303/300 - AbeCollins 22:44:36 09/24/09 (1)
- RE: Cary 308T / Cary 303/300 - mjcmt 04:56:43 09/25/09 (0)