Audible difference in high-end capacitors? - ABX samples

[MKWingchun]

I built a kit Transcendent Sound Grounded Grid Preamp, about 25 years ago, and since it was inexpensive, I decided to splurge on caps and tubes. I got some Bugle Boy (not that expensive at the time, but considered some of the best, now and then) 12au7's. I was surprised that they didn't make any difference. I then tried a bunch of caps, and found they didn't seem to make much difference either. When I posted my results online, I was met with disbelief, and asked for the tubes and caps "I didn't appreciate."

When buying ChiFi gear, my friends and I have noticed that early on, the tubes and caps were sub par, and we would replace them with decent quality parts that sounded better. The Jensen caps that are blue, are good enough and really inexpensive. There are a lot of tubes that are good enough, including some Chinese government made tubes, but not all of them. Most modern tubes and caps are really good, they are made to spec.

Some old Chinese govt made tubes seem to have the same problems that some Russian govt made gear has with a lack of quality control in some areas. Russian missile and aircraft tubes = really good, Russian consumer grade radio tubes, not so much. There are exceptions that are surprising, though.

The IFI Retro 50 integrated amplifier uses what are called EL84x tubes, that are rebranded (painted over, and I scraped the paint off a bad one) Chinese military spec tubes. They are a EL84 variant, 6p15p-ev, that is a little more powerful, and better sounding (or at least they provided more bass and lower mids). The IFI tubes were not defective, btw. The previous owner had beat the amp with an ax, and I repaired it, so that's not an IFI or Chinses reliability problem. Also, small company ChiFi has gotten a lot better in terms of part quality. This was my first post.

 

[Rewind]

I heard a big difference in type of capcitor in simple 1st order and 2nd order spesker level crossovers. I run Alumen only, as it is somewhat affordable and gives me nice clear highs. I compared it directly to Obbligato caps and Alumen was much better sounding. I also tried the laughably bad Mundorf M-cap classic series.

I also enjoy the Mundorf copper foil air coils and prefer them over normal type of copper air coils. The difference is very noticably.

 

[voodooless]

Nice anecdotes guys, but where is the proof?

 

[Doodski]

I built a kit Transcendent Sound Grounded Grid Preamp, about 25 years ago, and since it was inexpensive, I decided to splurge on caps and tubes. I got some Bugle Boy (not that expensive at the time, but considered some of the best, now and then) 12au7's. I was surprised that they didn't make any difference. I then tried a bunch of caps, and found they didn't seem to make much difference either. When I posted my results online, I was met with disbelief, and asked for the tubes and caps "I didn't appreciate."

When buying ChiFi gear, my friends and I have noticed that early on, the tubes and caps were sub par, and we would replace them with decent quality parts that sounded better. The Jensen caps that are blue, are good enough and really inexpensive. There are a lot of tubes that are good enough, including some Chinese government made tubes, but not all of them. Most modern tubes and caps are really good, they are made to spec.

Some old Chinese govt made tubes seem to have the same problems that some Russian govt made gear has with a lack of quality control in some areas. Russian missile and aircraft tubes = really good, Russian consumer grade radio tubes, not so much. There are exceptions that are surprising, though.

The IFI Retro 50 integrated amplifier uses what are called EL84x tubes, that are rebranded (painted over, and I scraped the paint off a bad one) Chinese military spec tubes. They are a EL84 variant, 6p15p-ev, that is a little more powerful, and better sounding (or at least they provided more bass and lower mids). The IFI tubes were not defective, btw. The previous owner had beat the amp with an ax, and I repaired it, so that's not an IFI or Chinses reliability problem. Also, small company ChiFi has gotten a lot better in terms of part quality. This was my first post.

Welcome to ASR. First post and I (we) noticed you used the term Chi-Fi. We don't use that term here. Many peeps come here with a ax to grind and they use it in a derogatory racist manner so the term is not permitted now. No biggy but I thought I should mention this.

 

[Cbdb2]

I did a blind A/B listening test (of so-so experimental quality) using a quality nonpolar electrolytic vs a quality (but not insane) metalized polypropylene as a coupling capacitor on the output of two different DIY headphone amps with capacitive outputs - one tubed and one solid state. I had a switch set up to select between the electrolytic and the film caps - each amp was set up with a nonpolar electrolytic output coupling capacitor and a film cap with a switch that select either . The switch was hidden from the listeners view and was switched by the experimenter as the listener was listening to Sennheiser HD800 'phones. Capacitors were selected to be of the same value within 2%- as determined by measuring the capacitor before it was soldered in.

Statistically, every listener could tell the difference between electrolytic and film at over 87% accuracy on average; some got 100% correct. Preference was 100% for the film cap.

Film cap was Audyn. NP electrolytic was Nichicon MUSE.

This is not the same as capacitors in a speaker crossover- nowhere near it. But it showed to my satisfaction that listeners can hear the difference between these particular capacitors used as output coupling caps. I infer that "film caps sound better than electrolytics" from this little study, which is really just my opinion, my bias. The experiment actually had too small a sample of listeners and too small a sample of capacitors to warrant my inference, yet I think my bias here has some accuracy when it comes to output coupling capacitors. It **MIGHT** also extend to interstage coupling caps, but really you'd need to do a listening study to confirm or debunk that.

FYI Frequency response of the headphones didn't change with electrolytic vs. film as far as I could measure using a calibrated mic and a home-made headphone coupler, and measuring only above about 250 Hz (I couldn't get good repeatability below 250 Hz with my home-made coupler.)

I don't think that what the listeners were hearing in this little experiment was related to frequency response. Listeners commented that the one switch position seemed to sound slightly distorted, and this turned out to be the NP electrolytic capacitor.

I lack the instrumentation to measure distortion, so I don't know if there is distortion being added or what.

How big were the caps? What was the signal voltage across the caps you where using. Larger coupling caps distort less, as there is less signal voltage across them. If this voltage is small enough (caps big enough) the audible differences will vanish.

 

[Ricardus]

I heard a big difference in type of capcitor in simple 1st order and 2nd order spesker level crossovers. I run Alumen only, as it is somewhat affordable and gives me nice clear highs. I compared it directly to Obbligato caps and Alumen was much better sounding. I also tried the laughably bad Mundorf M-cap classic series.

I also enjoy the Mundorf copper foil air coils and prefer them over normal type of copper air coils. The difference is very noticably.View attachment 319565

Were the mids "choclatey"

 

[DonR]

a sad preference - most recently due to design and build quality falling off a cliff - is recapping brand new gear 'just because'...

I have seen products less than a year old spill their 3rd-tier cap guts. It is quite common the lower down the price curve you go.

 

[Chris M]

Troels also seems to have a preference for Alumen...

Alumen-Z-Cap

 

[voodooless]

Troels also seems to have a preference for Alumen...

Alumen-Z-Cap

Also just a nice story…

 

[Rewind]

Were the mids "choclatey"

That would be Mundorf Mcap Supreme Evo Silvergoldoil you are thinking about.

 

[fpitas]

Were the mids "choclatey"

But does it have the fine grittiness of real chocolate?

 

[Chris M]

They called it 'conchieren'

 

[ctrl]

Added a section in post#2 about analyzing sample recordings with DeltaWave called "6) Samples analyzed with DeltaWave".
There you can also find a recording containing the difference between the high-end Alumen Z-Cap and the standard cap using the "Fast Car" samples.

So if you don't feel like doing an ABX test, you should at least have heard how big the audible difference (with all phase, distortion, decay, SPL... differences included) between the capacitors is in reality (but be careful with the volume control).

 

[Thomas_A]

Have not followed this, but how many have made ABX? I have not, since it should be far below my threshold of hearing.

 

[antcollinet]

Nice anecdotes guys, but where is the proof?

Or even just a little bit of evidence.

 

[Cbdb2]

Troels also seems to have a preference for Alumen...

Alumen-Z-Cap

And he sure knows his physics, not. "Every capacitor has a memory. Electrons get stuck in the plastic or paper that separates the windings and may distort the shape of the signal passing."
He spends hundreds on crossover components than mounts wire wound resistors (not the low inductance kind) on top of large inductors effectively making a transformer between the two.

 

[Vigovsky]

"I heard a big difference in type of capacitor in simple 1st order.."

In 1st order of a crossover, the influence of the capacitor is usually clearly audible, especially on HF with a high-quality tweeter, source, amplifier, listening room, high quality audio, etc. In my experience of tests, Mundorf's Supreme is good and higher models as well. Supreme provide great tonal diversity of musical instruments in the upper registers, stability, transparency in the upper octaves. This is clearly audible in 1st order. Also, these capacitors have extremely low ESR, precision repeatability of capacitance, very low parasitic inductance, etc.

 

[Chris M]

Unfortunately we are going in high-end circles. A person who hears something does not need proof of what he hears. Everyone else does...

...have you heard my/a tinnitus... everyone who suffers from it can say yes, but the others...

I don't want to say that there are no differences, but it is technically difficult to show/prove (e.g. frequency response/phase response)

 

[antcollinet]

In 1st order of a crossover, the influence of the capacitor is usually clearly audible, especially on HF with a high-quality tweeter, source, amplifier, listening room, high quality audio, etc. In my experience of tests, Mundorf's Supreme is good and higher models as well. Supreme provide great tonal diversity of musical instruments in the upper registers, stability, transparency in the upper octaves. This is clearly audible in 1st order. Also, these capacitors have extremely low ESR, precision repeatability of capacitance, very low parasitic inductance, etc.

Hand waving is not what we do here.

Bring your evidence, or you are not convincing anyone. "That which can be asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence."

 

[DonR]

Unfortunately we are going in high-end circles. A person who hears something does not need proof of what he hears. Everyone else does...

...have you heard my/a tinnitus... everyone who suffers from it can say yes, but the others...

I don't want to say that there are no differences, but it is technically difficult to show/prove (e.g. frequency response/phase response)

If you make a claim, you have to show evidence.