Paradisea Dac

I think you may have had a problem with your Cosecant - it's far from dull. Very smooth, yes, and very linear with excellent timbre, but it's also quite dynamic.

The MHDT DACs are all of these things too.

I really think you may have had a bad tube or something..

Paul, maybe you are right? Yet another reason to hate tubes. I have tried 2 different WE 396 tubes with the Paradisea and there is no way anyone who heard it would say it sounds better than the stock tube (the one that came with it) I was told by more than a couple of guys that the 396 tube was quite an improvment over the stock tube. I tried to like it but it just doesn't sound good.

Ejlif, you are the first person I have seen that did not like the we 396 in the paradisea+. I thought the exact same thing when I tried that tube in my paradisea+. The stock tube sounded better. If you want to try an inexpensive tube that I thought sounded great in my system, and it will remain in the paradisea+. Try a NOS raytheon 5670, you can grab a pair on e-bay now for $25 shipping and all, so it isn't a huge investment and like I said these tubes sound the best of all that I tried in my system. The raytheons that I got are from 1952.

I've thought about suggesting to the eBay guy that he offer flavor packs of 3-5 single tubes so we can roll them through the DAC... I want one of each not two! :-)

I preferred a GE 5 Star 5670 to the WE 396. In fact, I liked the GE tube so much I've kept it in my collection. I sold all my other 396 and 5670 tubes.