Feliks-Audio Elise Tube Amp Review (NOT)

Discussion in 'Headphone Amplifiers and Combo (DAC/Amp) Units' started by purr1n, Jun 12, 2016.

  1. nephilim

    nephilim Acquaintance

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    I spent weeks (if not months) on solving that hum issue and also checked potential ground loops, lifted ground, etc. The hum also occured with no source connected - just the amp, power cord and headphones. However, I still assume it was a defective unit and will not recommend against this amp. I am really curious if the second sample will be quiet. Will report here.
     
  2. hypnos1

    hypnos1 New

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    With all due respect, anyone wishing to hurl insults really should do their homework properly first...I, and most others, have in fact moved away from using external PSs.

    And before I leave... on the subject of reliability, I sincerely hope that members and visitors here will take into consideration the dozens of trouble-free owners, as opposed to unfortunate, isolated instances....is there any (tube)amp that never has the occasional problem, given the reliance upon so many components, not to mention the hazards of shipping lol?! A fair and balanced view is all that is asked when making assessments and important decisions...
     
    Last edited: Jun 14, 2016
  3. vince741

    vince741 New

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    I'm sure Marvey, from Eddie Current knows a lot more about it than you hypnos1.
     
  4. ButtUglyJeff

    ButtUglyJeff Stunningly beautiful IRL

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    I don't think anyone here bashed the Elise on build quality, have they? Even with @nephilim having a bum unit, he's reserved his opinion....
     
  5. insidious meme

    insidious meme Ambivalent Kumquat

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    Ooh, someone who didn't do their homework before posting on here.

    Is that a promise?
     
  6. SSL

    SSL Friend

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    This guy knows what's up.
     
  7. purr1n

    purr1n Desire for betterer is endless.

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    I apologize for my outburst. When I read what you wrote at lunch yesterday, I was short on sleep and was high on Monster energy drinks because I ran out of my personal supply of Red Bull. Red Bull is a European brand and has less toxins than Monster. Monster does weird things to me. I also choked on bit of fatty pork in my Tokyo Shoryu Ramen leaving me more annoyed than usual.

    I understand that tube rolling is fun, but SuperBAF is not the place to discuss it or encourage it. You are not a manufacturer of tube amps, so you have absolutely no idea what we have to deal with. Anecdotal tales of "many people on HF having no problems" doesn't cut it. Hard data does. About twenty percent of our service work is because of our own stupidity (we didn't do something right, we forgot a screw, or a part broke). Another twenty percent the result of the user attempting self repair. The remaining sixty percent is the result of people using tubes, adapters, combinations thereof that should not have be used.

    I never said anything about lack of reliability. The great thing about tube amps is that they are super robust. You can plug all sorts of random tubes in that happen to fit into the socket, and many times nothing will happen, or at most a fuse will blow. The fact that you even mention "isolated incidents" is concerning because one hundred percent of our customers blowing up their amps with excessive tube rolling is not reported publicly. It can take more effort for a manufacturer to troubleshoot an amp than to make a new one.

    Having read what you wrote, I am convinced that you have absolutely no idea what you are doing. Basically what you are doing the equivalent of rolling intakes on a car without even knowing if you are screwing up your MAF sensor and by extension your AF ratios.

    If you are rolling equivalent pin compatible tubes, that is fine, because you are not really rolling random tubes not specified by the manufacturer. You are just rolling the same tubes identified by a different designation, as is common among USA, Europe, and USSR. If you are rolling tubes with different electrical characteristics, it's best to be careful. A common misconception is that as long as the tube has the same heater voltage and same pin out, then everything is fine. This may not be true! Different tubes may have the same heater voltage, but one may have higher current requirements. If the current requirements exceed the design of the heater power supply of the amp, nothing bad may happen immediately, but eventually, the heater circuit will die. Different tubes also have different curve traces, showing where they are the most linear. This will determine plate voltages, bias, resistors at the plate and cathode, etc. Some of these operating points can be subjective, set accordingly by what the manufacturer feels is best. But they do need to within certain limits. Different tubes also have different plate resistances (with some similar pin compatible types having plate resistances varying by almost a magnitude of two) which can be crucial depending upon the circuit is immediately after it. Some tubes are inherently not very linear, so they require feedback.

    The fact that you have not mentioned any of these factors while you encourage "excessive" tube rolling is disconcerting. Also, your mentioning of HDtracks as some sort of holy grail of quality recordings is disconcerting. While I personally feel that hires 24 bit digital recordings are discernible from Red Book (CD 16/44), I also feel that ultimately, the quality of the mastering is much more important (and much more easily discernible) than the infinitesimal quality improvements inherent with hires formats. Many of us have found the mastering quality of HDtracks material hit or miss. In some instances, we found that HDtracks hires material was simply up scaled from Red Book, and contained no additional information. In essence, we find HDtracks a little bit shady because they provide no information about their sources of original material. Finally, I've never had to burn-in a tube for 200 hours to get optimal performance as you have suggested. In my experience, solid-state electronics tend to take a long time to burn in or require a long warm up time. Tubes tend to burn in very quickly, in a matter of hours, and only if not used for fifty years. Capacitors do take a while to burn in, but I surmise this process goes quickly in tube amps because of the higher voltages and heat.

    Getting back to the topic of "excessive" tube rolling - if you are going to do that, you may as well roll capacitors too. Rolling capacitors will change the sound just as much as tube rolling. And while we are at it, maybe we can change the bias a bit to see how the sound changes. I see you've already attached an external 12V supply to power the heaters for the FDD20 which don't use the 6.3V heater in the Elise. Seriously, at this point, what you are doing is not tube rolling. I believe one of the other tubes you mentioned is a pentode strapped to a triode (presumably on some funky adapter to you can plug it into a 6080 triode socket). This is like putting a Corvette engine into an FR-S / BRZ. You are simply just better off learning about tube amp circuits and building your own tube amp.
     
    Last edited: Jun 14, 2016
  8. purr1n

    purr1n Desire for betterer is endless.

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    Check with your source not plugged in too.
     
  9. nephilim

    nephilim Acquaintance

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    I even went so far that -after the old, humming power meter had been replaced- I disconnected all fuses except the one for the two power outlets next to the fuse box. The amp was plugged into one of those outlets, again w/o source just headphones. The house was fully shut down except for the Elise - it still hummed.

    But enough of beating a dead horse - the amp is gone and the next iteration is hopefully as hum free as reported by (apparently) everybody else. It better does - I really liked the sound and want to have it back.
     
  10. error

    error Friend

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    This is much better reply than your “in da mood” post. I was wondering (I have little electronics education background but it was long time ago) how can people throw any tube they found on some specifically designed tube amplifier (Elise and its Head-fi thread)...and indeed it is quite stupid thing to do... :) So thank you for explaining that.
     
  11. hypnos1

    hypnos1 New

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    Hi Marvey.

    Thanks for your reply - I do fully understand and appreciate your statements given your situation. I can indeed imagine only too well the frustrations of a manufacturer faced with the results of "tinkering", and agree in principle with your reluctance to associate with such practices.

    However, I would just like to qualify somewhat my own position as regards experimentation with tubes that veer from original configuration...but only in my own defence, and not as overt encouragement to others.

    I am indeed no electronics engineer, but I fully understand that any particular circuit is designed so as to function at certain operating points, for both optimum and safe performance. I realise also the risks associated with straying too far from said configuration, and have always been prepared to accept that any such risks are on my own head and would invalidate the warranty. And I have ALWAYS made this perfectly clear to anyone else wishing to take this risk.

    I myself and/or others have also informed the Feliks-Audio guys of the different tubes considered, and ascertained the likelihood of any possible major negative consequences. Obviously, there may be instances where only time might show up unexpected consequences, which is another reason why I personally trial a tube over MANY hours, the better to hopefully show anything obviously untoward...(and yes, there is still always the possibility of component failure at some later date...).
    Then others - who are also prepared to take the risk - may choose to replicate my own findings and again, confirm the stability of the new combination...are we mad?...most certainly! But in the process, definite positive results have ensued...no matter how unlikely/unpredicted. And this is all AT OUR OWN RISK. For those who are more cautious, we constantly remind folks of the great variety of 6SN7s that will bring superlative results...the choice is theirs...

    Re. HDTracks...most certainly, not ALL material is of the best quality by any means - I assumed this also would be taken as a given known...

    Re. the 'reliability' aspect, I was simply confused somewhat by your sudden, dramatic change in impressions of Elise based on a single unfortunate experience...especially given your professional status.

    I had originally come here in the hope there might be the chance of reasoned, informed, balanced debate on what has turned out to be a very controversial issue. But from the obvious attitude of some here - who are probably not in your own particular position - this is quite clearly not to be the case...and so to please them, I shall indeed carry out the promise to leave. I can only hope there are however at least some here of broader mind and generosity of spirit...
     
  12. Elcid

    Elcid New

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    How does Elise compare with Woo WA3. Given the same price.

    Thank you.
     
  13. purr1n

    purr1n Desire for betterer is endless.

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    It's not just the technical factors (though I'd like to see more discussion of tube characteristics and operating points in these "excessive" tube rolling threads on other forums).

    What it comes down to why bother with a perfectly fine amp that uses good sounding tubes in the first place? When I opened the box, I saw the Sylvania 6SN7s and Mullard 6080s. I whispered to myself: "Wow, Amin got himself some really good sounding tubes. Did this guy read my mind on what I what liked?"

    I mean that's it. Don't need anything more. Just listen to music! This hobby is neurotic enough anyway. In another post, someone mentioned that these self-absorbed kids on Facebook / Twitter should be forcibly be taken out into the woods cut off from the Internet to cure them from their Facebook / Twitter neurosis. Well, I propose that excessive tube rollers should be stripped of all their tubes except for a good set of tubes the amp was made for, and forced to listen to music for a month (instead of tubes).
     
    Last edited: Jun 14, 2016
  14. purr1n

    purr1n Desire for betterer is endless.

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    Depends on what you want. The WA3 is kind of like warm gooey sludgy poop. You know, the kind that has a really hard time coming out of our asses and is hard to clean off with TP.

    The Elise also slaughters the WA7. Kind of like how zombie Mountain rips the face off of a Sparrow.


    WA6 might put up a good fight.
     
    Last edited: Jun 14, 2016
  15. jsgraha

    jsgraha 30% of my portfolio is magic beans - Friend

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    I've learnt my lesson with tube rolling as well about four years ago with my previous amp. The fun which come out of it was similar to the fun buying a lotteries number IMO, hoping to get a jackpot. The amp was WA6-SE and I thought its a decent amp but I was thinking to tube roll it so it can be lift to the next level. I ended up to buying all new or NOS tubes following HF to the value of more than the amp itself. Once I realise that none of the tubes combo, including USAF596 or NOS 6EM7 lift the amp to next level, I decided to give it up an sell the amp and tubes. It was sold half the price of those amp and tubes locally. And I was feeling lucky that I achieved that price actually.

    Then I bought stratus used from a friend, for slightly less the price of what I spend on previous amp and tubes combined. Well, even on stock, it outperformed the previous amp. I still tried and bought tubes, but very rarely, and particularly the expensive one, only locally and used. Luckily so far, my combined tubes in 4 years still cost under half the price of my current amp.
     
  16. sashafuckinggrey

    sashafuckinggrey Acquaintance

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    i would never imagined i get GoT spoilered on this forum.

    Shame
     
  17. CoLdAsSauLt

    CoLdAsSauLt New

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    Did you try the amp some place else than your home or even block (same power issues maybe)?
     
  18. nephilim

    nephilim Acquaintance

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    Yes, I did. But I could not shut down that house like I did in my place, so one could argue that there could have been an evil fridge causing the issue. Anyway, Marvey & KonPeki did not hear any hum with the Mullard powers so I can only repeat what I said in #49.
     
  19. PerfectAnalog

    PerfectAnalog Acquaintance

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    Any chance you have a sine-wave UPS in the house? I'm partial to APC smart-UPS's. Testing with one would eliminate any question of whether your local power environment brings the issue out. Every dwelling's wiring is of different quality, as are the devices plugged into it. All sorts of things can add noise, any of which the Elise could be sensitive to. That would explain why it's visible to some and not others. If it proves quiet on a UPD, narrowing down the source of the sensitivity becomes easier.


    It's plausible that a component they chose for the Elise is sensitive to something they don't have in their testing environment. Or that a specific instance of a component just happens to be sensitive to something through manufacturing variation.
     
  20. PerfectAnalog

    PerfectAnalog Acquaintance

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    My Elise is plugged into an APC smart-UPS 1000VA. It is very quiet to way past what could be a safe listening volume.

    I'm not advocating using UPS's as a solution by any means. It just so happens my setup is at my computer where I require them. It should work for 2.5-3 sigma worth of outlets for sure.

    I do believe it could very helpful in the debug process. I really really hate noise. Really really. Like not kidding. Hate it. :)
     

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