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Post by adaboy on Oct 3, 2015 2:52:44 GMT -5
Anyone ever seen, touched, listened to, or currently have this phono stage?
If so what are/were your thoughts? I have an opportunity to get it used from a local hifi Jolida dealer for half the cost new and am wondering if this is the step up over the XPS-1.
All opinions will be respected.
Thanks
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evan1
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Posts: 133
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Post by evan1 on Oct 3, 2015 5:23:31 GMT -5
I had one and bought it based upon all the reviews around the web. Never liked it. Sound was thin, did not live up to the hype for me. I have the XPS1 and the sound is rich and full.
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Post by brubacca on Oct 3, 2015 7:45:06 GMT -5
I had one and bought it based upon all the reviews around the web. Never liked it. Sound was thin, did not live up to the hype for me. I have the XPS1 and the sound is rich and full. Did you give the tube time to burn in? Many tubes take several to many hours to burn in and sound their best.. A dealer that i trust and who has other options at the same price hughly recommends this product, and my experience is that he is never pushing a brand. |
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evan1
Emo VIPs
Posts: 133
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Post by evan1 on Oct 3, 2015 7:47:41 GMT -5
I had one and bought it based upon all the reviews around the web. Never liked it. Sound was thin, did not live up to the hype for me. I have the XPS1 and the sound is rich and full. Did you give the tube time to burn in? Many tubes take several to many hours to burn in and sound their best.. A dealer that i trust and who has other options at the same price hughly recommends this product, and my experience is that he is never pushing a brand. Yes I had it for a year and rolled different tubes also. Just didn't do it for me. YMMV |
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Post by sidvicious on Oct 3, 2015 12:32:20 GMT -5
Anyone ever seen, touched, listened to? Yes, I've done all, three and I still own one and I took it out of the closet last week for three days to do a comparison with some cabling. I've had mine for almost 4 years and not only is it a good phono stage, it gets better with tube rolling. I compared it to my Musical Surroundings Nova Phonomenia (Battery Operated) and the biggest difference between the two of them is noise and bass response. The Phonomenia is almost silent even in AC mode and it has better bass response (When I say silent, I mean switching to another input other than phono and listening for noise, there is none hardly. The Jolida is better in the mid range and slightly better in the top end (treble), the tube warmness thing. I have kept the Jolida because, I had plan on doing the OP-AMP upgrades from stock to Burr Brown OPA-627's and the Capacitor upgrade from stock to Burr Brown.
The Jolida has tons of cartridge loading options for moving coil and moving magnet and gain going up to I believe 90db, but with gain comes noise, and I had it at 70db during testing, which is the lowest I would go with it in my set up. You can load just about any type of cartridge from very low moving coil to moving magnet and it has the Pico Fared setting for Moving Magnet. I have version 1, there is a JD9II, which has upgraded capacitors and tubes. This phono stage is highly upgradable and if you go to Audio Circle.com there are upgrades listed. On the internet as a whole there are all kind of modifications and I believe on Jolida and Uptown Audio's website I believe they offer the upgrades as well, upgrades I-4, which would include Cardas rewiring. These upgrades at level 3 or 4 should take the noise down 45db. I have also heard the bass response gets a lot better with the upgrades as well and that the phono stage will operate in the above $2000 range with the updates level 4, but the upgrades aren't cheap if a company does them. This is a good phono preamp, which is why I have a hard time parting with it, but my ears are very sensitive to noise and even pitch control on turntables, which is why I've gone through several turntables to end at my current one.
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Post by adaboy on Oct 3, 2015 13:16:19 GMT -5
Anyone ever seen, touched, listened to? Yes, I've done all, three and I still own one and I took it out of the closet last week for three days to do a comparison with some cabling. I've had mine for almost 4 years and not only is it a good phono stage, it gets better with tube rolling. I compared it to my Musical Surroundings Nova Phonomenia (Battery Operated) and the biggest difference between the two of them is noise and bass response. The Phonomenia is almost silent even in AC mode and it has better bass response (When I say silent, I mean switching to another input other than phono and listening for noise, there is none hardly. The Jolida is better in the mid range and slightly better in the top end (treble), the tube warmness thing. I have kept the Jolida because, I had plan on doing the OP-AMP upgrades from stock to Burr Brown OPA-627's and the Capacitor upgrade from stock to Burr Brown. The Jolida has tons of cartridge loading options for moving coil and moving magnet and gain going up to I believe 90db, but with gain comes noise, and I had it at 70db during testing, which is the lowest I would go with it in my set up. You can load just about any type of cartridge from very low moving coil to moving magnet and it has the Pico Fared setting for Moving Magnet. I have version 1, there is a JD9II, which has upgraded capacitors and tubes. This phono stage is highly upgradable and if you go to Audio Circle.com there are upgrades listed. On the internet as a whole there are all kind of modifications and I believe on Jolida and Uptown Audio's website I believe they offer the upgrades as well, upgrades I-4, which would include Cardas rewiring. These upgrades at level 3 or 4 should take the noise down 45db. I have also heard the bass response gets a lot better with the upgrades as well and that the phono stage will operate in the above $2000 range with the updates level 4, but the upgrades aren't cheap if a company does them. This is a good phono preamp, which is why I have a hard time parting with it, but my ears are very sensitive to noise and even pitch control on turntables, which is why I've gone through several turntables to end at my current one. Good deal bud and thanks for the feedback. The dealer is letting me audition it for a week or so and It sounds nice so far, but I'm new to tubes and have been told to allow it to stay plugged in a warm for 24 hours before giving it a serious listen. The session at 2am was getting better and better. I guess it's a good problem to have with trying to see which sounds best in my set-up. Would be nice if there was a tube HT prepro with HDMI etc so I could have the best of both worlds for tube. |
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Post by adaboy on Oct 3, 2015 13:18:44 GMT -5
Did you give the tube time to burn in? Many tubes take several to many hours to burn in and sound their best.. A dealer that i trust and who has other options at the same price hughly recommends this product, and my experience is that he is never pushing a brand. Yes I had it for a year and rolled different tubes also. Just didn't do it for me. YMMV I appreciate your candor and time, can you give me more information on your experience including the tube rolling with observations. I find it very important to hear detracting points of view. Thanks |
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Post by plm on Oct 7, 2015 0:43:53 GMT -5
I have one too, and can't imagine ever getting rid of it. Mine is pretty heavily modified now though, which has it punching well above its weight.
You can get huge bang for the buck with opamp swaps and putting better tubes in it, which can all be done without any soldering.
I've changed the coupling caps and done more to mine, but tube and opamp rolling alone can massively improve what is already a great preamp.
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