Things have been quite happily stable in my "main" system here for quite some time now - same turntable, arms and carts, same Anthem Pre-1 pre-amp, Bottlehead Seduction phono pre for one arm, the internal stage in the Anthem for the other. Same power amp - Heybrook P-2, same CD/DAC, Magnum Dynalab tuner, de Capo speakers.
Along came a couple of items for sale here on the Haven and suddenly we're off on a new trip of sorts.
First was the Jelco TK-950L. That one is still in the box, waiting for a new arm board. I'm looking forward to getting that done up soon, not that the Audiocraft AC-400C hasn't been really quite marvellous. I picked up a micrometer base for it and I think it will look the part as well as sound super and be a relative doddle to set up, something I could never say for the Audiocraft.
Then along came a lovely Redboy TVC. I've been curious about TVCs for years and after hearing JohnVF's a couple of years ago have wanted to try one in my own system. The Anthem Pre-1 tube set was getting noisy and in need of replacement so it seemed to me now is the time. After a long and curious voyage from Minnesota (including being held hostage for a week by CBSA) the TVC finally arrived here a couple of days ago. Here it is as installed in the system - you've seen pics of the unit itself in the thread about such things. The Redboy SUT and the DAC ended up having to be tucked in behind due to my still not having built my audio shelving. Another project...
Upfront - everything has an upside and a downside. The downside with the change to the TVC is largely the loss of convenience. With the Anthem I had gobs of inputs and outputs and a really lovely inboard MM/MC phono stage to accommodate one of the arms on my table. All of the changes were easily done from the front - two arms, tuner, CD and tape. A new path will need to be found there!
I have one of these floating about in the closet so I think the tuner, tape and computer can run into one input through it and the second output can run into it as well.
So, how does it sound, you ask? Well, I set myself a moving target,as usual. I started out with the Heybrook P-2 power amp which s really very nice and after a bit of playing in things sounded really quite lovely, but then I really had to see how the TVC worked out with the CJ MV-45 tube amp. It had spent the past 18 months in the closet and so I had two pieces to get up to speed. Still, I had to know...
End result after a day or so of considerable listening time? Glorious - spaciously open, balanced, incredible harmonic complexity and excellent resolution (though not of the glaring sort). The sound stage is bigger and more detailed than I've experienced before - in my little12 x 12 my speakers are 5' apart in one corner and I sit about 6' or 7' away. On one particular recording the apparent stage was about 10' across and up to the ceiling with an incredible amount of information outside the centre envelope. Pretty freaky.
On top of all of this the TVC solved issues I've had with the output from some things being too hot for the input sensitivity of others. Every preamp I've owned has been a bit too "hot" for the MV-45 and the TVC seems to be absolutely perfect. My DAC has been too hot for any preamp I've owned so I ran 12db attenuators inline. No more! Everything just plays and is happy!
So, a final answer I think. There will always be some things that can be improved upon, but I think perhaps not this one.
Along came a couple of items for sale here on the Haven and suddenly we're off on a new trip of sorts.
First was the Jelco TK-950L. That one is still in the box, waiting for a new arm board. I'm looking forward to getting that done up soon, not that the Audiocraft AC-400C hasn't been really quite marvellous. I picked up a micrometer base for it and I think it will look the part as well as sound super and be a relative doddle to set up, something I could never say for the Audiocraft.
Then along came a lovely Redboy TVC. I've been curious about TVCs for years and after hearing JohnVF's a couple of years ago have wanted to try one in my own system. The Anthem Pre-1 tube set was getting noisy and in need of replacement so it seemed to me now is the time. After a long and curious voyage from Minnesota (including being held hostage for a week by CBSA) the TVC finally arrived here a couple of days ago. Here it is as installed in the system - you've seen pics of the unit itself in the thread about such things. The Redboy SUT and the DAC ended up having to be tucked in behind due to my still not having built my audio shelving. Another project...
Upfront - everything has an upside and a downside. The downside with the change to the TVC is largely the loss of convenience. With the Anthem I had gobs of inputs and outputs and a really lovely inboard MM/MC phono stage to accommodate one of the arms on my table. All of the changes were easily done from the front - two arms, tuner, CD and tape. A new path will need to be found there!
I have one of these floating about in the closet so I think the tuner, tape and computer can run into one input through it and the second output can run into it as well.
So, how does it sound, you ask? Well, I set myself a moving target,as usual. I started out with the Heybrook P-2 power amp which s really very nice and after a bit of playing in things sounded really quite lovely, but then I really had to see how the TVC worked out with the CJ MV-45 tube amp. It had spent the past 18 months in the closet and so I had two pieces to get up to speed. Still, I had to know...
End result after a day or so of considerable listening time? Glorious - spaciously open, balanced, incredible harmonic complexity and excellent resolution (though not of the glaring sort). The sound stage is bigger and more detailed than I've experienced before - in my little12 x 12 my speakers are 5' apart in one corner and I sit about 6' or 7' away. On one particular recording the apparent stage was about 10' across and up to the ceiling with an incredible amount of information outside the centre envelope. Pretty freaky.
On top of all of this the TVC solved issues I've had with the output from some things being too hot for the input sensitivity of others. Every preamp I've owned has been a bit too "hot" for the MV-45 and the TVC seems to be absolutely perfect. My DAC has been too hot for any preamp I've owned so I ran 12db attenuators inline. No more! Everything just plays and is happy!
So, a final answer I think. There will always be some things that can be improved upon, but I think perhaps not this one.
Last edited: