Tube dampeners on ARC gear ... FREE TWEAK

Audiolover718 wrote,

"The ARC rings sound constricted by comparison and almost give, dare I say "nervous" kind of presentation. The herbies brought a very relaxed sound, with an added sense of ease and weight to the sound. I believe the rings have something to do with the ARC gear having that solid state kind of presentation. I also feel like the Highes are cleaner and less bright than before."

That's my experience with all of the elastomer rings I have tried as well as ALL other types of tube dampers with the notable exception of Herbies dampers. I also started with the original Herbies Halo dampers and have had the latest version as well. In fact, removing the elastomer rings and using no tube dampers at provided a more open sound. Could this whole thing be an example of expectation bias?

cheers

^^^
Hmmm ... velly, velly interesting indeed. 

I'm going to have to revisit those Herbie dampeners. 

one observation is that all or almost all other dampers have a lot of contact surface area with the glass whereas Herbies dampers have the extreme minimum contact area due to their very clever construction. As Isoclean the Japanese high end emporium states so succinctly, "be careful of over dumping."

^^^ Agreed.  I've had the experience of over dampening a number of times. It calls to mind an experiment I did with shrink wrap on my Well Tempered tone arm.  First layer - overall improvement. Second layer - no change. Third layer - a dulling of the sound. I settled on one layer and that layer remains on the tone arm to this day. 

Oregonpapa, if you have some herbies that aren’t in use, then I highly suggest that you brush the dust off of them and replace the ARC rings that are at least on the signal tubes of your pre. For me, the difference is not subtle. I do feel at first, you may think you’ve lost some of the highs as compared to the ARC rings, but I think you’ll agree, once you let the herbies settle in, that the ARC rings give a very highly tightly focused sound, but absolutely strangles the bloom of the instruments- Minimizing the full natural fleshiness of them. It may seem at first like a lower Rez, but you will actually realize after a little while, that the sound is actually more true to the real sense of the instrument. Yes, detail is very exciting to me, but it’s not everything. My stereo actually breathes now. I didn’t know just how much of the signature of my preamp was due to the elastomer rings. Yes, with the original herbies halos, the sound is somewhat slower than rings, dynamics are a teeny bit lessened, but the overall presentation is MUCH more tonally correct with more natural timbres, harmonic complexity and image sizes, smoother better defined highs, with better definition, * even if the noise floor seems ever so slightly higher. I’m in love with the new found bass weight. I may need to readjust my subwoofer...I look forward to hearing if you hear what I do. I wonder if the new top of the line herbies would be a worthwhile upgrade from my "old school"halos. The more I listen to different well known material, the more I realize just how the herbies blow the rings away.  I think they sound even better tonight than last night, after settling on the tube.  They are freaking amazing. Wow. Listening to Bon Jovi prayer 94 and it's become a religious experience. It's like a whole new song. In fact I would say. I'm actually hearing MORE resolution! I'm floored.