In Reply to: Tube rolling the Carissa posted by efm2 on October 20, 2006 at 19:37:14:
Hi Efm2,
I got my Carissa a month ago. Joe Fratus shipped me additional set of NOS tubes i.e. Tesla E88CC MIL Gold Pins and 12BH7As (made in USA, can't read the manufacturer). My observations:
1. Break-in - Carissa requires a lot of time - after approx. 60 hours it starts to sound good, after 100 even better and reaches the top performance apparently after 300 hrs. (Mine is currently at 160 hrs so I cannot confirm this).
So have patience.
2. Tube rolling - I installed the stock tubes but tried the NOS last week. Well, I guess they ewere not broken in because they sounded no better (probably worse in fact). I decided to continue with the base set until the amp is fully broken in and experiment later.
3. By far the best thing I did was putting Finite Elemente Ceraballs feet under the amp. The sound focussed, bass tightened up and I heard more detail in top end. Wonderful!
Conclusion: I suggest you just let the Carissa break in and consider vibration control tweaks (apart from Ceraballs I have Herbie's Hal O'rings on the small tubes).
Regards,
D.
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Follow Ups
- Re: Tube rolling the Carissa - Darek 02:14:48 10/21/06 (1)
- Re: Tube rolling the Carissa - efm2 07:07:37 10/21/06 (0)