Description

This system is great for my 800 sq foot apartment, If you've never heard Deja Vu equipment and you're ever in the DC area their store in Vienna VA is amazing, a haven for tubes and analog. I ended up with my amp after years of taking broken gear to Vu's to be fixed and having him loan me gear that sounded so much better. Finally I made a trade and ended up with my current amp and the best and probably last amp I will ever own. Especially since the NOS Aerovox cap upgrade Vu recommended a huge upgrade in every way.. My preamp I picked up on Agon, a cool early Deja Vu prototype full function with an active tubed crossover. Both amp and preamp were built by Pavel their former designer and the synergy makes both greater than the sum of their parts.

Later additions are my Audionote  Dac-3 Signature and Auralic Aries Mini and I'm now addicted to streaming. Audio Note Lexus speaker cables, Furutech power cables, a Jorma Design digital cable,  and my analog interconnects are Kondo and Auditorium 23.

Got  some new footers Gregitek Aries Graf, Combak Ebony Pucks, plus added a Synergistic Black Quantum fuse to my preamp.  Improvements all around the system keeps sounding better and better!

Just got my new Audio Note AN/Jlx's and the system is truly singing!
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Components Toggle details

    • Auralic Aries Mini with Sbooster Power Supply
    A great sounding little streamer and love the Lightning DS app!
    • Audio Note UK DAC-3 Signature
    Audio Note Dac-3 Signature built in1995! I recently had the coupling caps upgraded to AN copper caps. Output tubes are a pair of Mullard CV2492 and the Dac sounds really sweet, transparent, natural, with great tone.
    • Deja Vu Audio Full-Function Tubed Stereo Preamp
    Tubed preamp from Deja Vu Audio in Vienna VA. This is an older prototype with a built-in tubed crossover and phonostage, but I run it just as a linestage. A mix of vintage and current parts, including XLO internal wire and an ALPs volume pot from 1977 that was chosen for it's superior sound quality. Amazing warm, organic, lifelike sound, very synergistic with my amp both designed and built by Deja Vu's former designer whiz Pavel.
    • Deja Vu Audio Custom EL-34 Stereo Amplifier
    A stereo pushpull amp with a pair of EL34's per channel, three 6SN7's up front and a 5U4G rectifier. Triode wired running in Class A putting out 17 warm sweet powerful watts per channel. Vintage Acrosound transformer from the 60's. With Gold Lion KT-77's and a recapping last year with NOS Aerovox Caps from the 1960s. A 60's era  RCA rectifier and Sylvania 6SN7's complete the package.
    • Audio Note AN/Jlx in Olive Wood Finish on Sound Anchors
    I finally pulled the trigger on new speakers after 10 years with my previous JMlabs Micros. Vu at Deja Vu Audio really pointed me in the right direction with the AN/J's they arrived yesterday and look and already sound great. They are the Lexus copper wired version which Vu recommended for it's warmth compared to the silver wired versions.  He also recommended the original paper woofer over the newer blue hemp cones, finding the hemp drivers to be a bit dry sounding. These sound great already and should really start to sing around the 100 hour mark!
    • Cerious Technologies Nano Signature Power Cable
    I have this powering my power conditioner, great budget PC!
    • Furutech FP-S032N With F1-11 Gold Connectors
    I have two of these excellent  12awg  power cords feeding my DAC and preamp, custom made for me by Chris Venhaus at VH Audio.
    • ExactPower 2000 AC Power Conditoner
    Balanced voltage device and line conditioner.
    • Variac 2000VA
    For my power amp, ramps up voltage gradually to a steady 120V.
    • Jorma Design Digital Cable
    The best digital cable I've heard in my system bar none.  Beautiful organic vivid sound with real musical flow. Connecting the Aries Mini to my AN Dac.
    • Kondo AudioNote Japan KSL-Vc
    Kondo's copper interconnect running from my DAC to preamp. I thought it would be perfect to add AN Japan to AN UK and I was right. This cable sounds fantastic an improvement in tonality, timbre, tonal color, and detail. Music flows better and sounds more real.
    • Auditorium 23 Interconnect
    This gave me that final ahhh moment when i connected it between my amp and preamp. Just a gorgeous sounding cable that makes music sound more real and natural.
    • Audio Note Lexus Copper Speaker Cables
    Hooked up my new AN/Jlx's with the same copper wire they are internally wired with, nice to get away from garden hose sized cables to something more human sized.
    • Gregitek Aries Graf Footers
    Carbon fiber and aluminum under my Aries Mini and my amp.
    • Combak Corp Brass and Ebony Footers
    Under my preamp.
    • Synergistic Research Black Quantom Fuse
    Installed in my preamp.
    • Synology DC 214 Play
    NAS server feeding my Aries Mini two 4 TB hard drives in a hybrid RAID configuration.
    • High Fidelity Cables MC-0.5
    I was loaned one of these from my friend Jim @lowrider57, and liked the more relaxed feeling it gave to the music. When High Fidelity was closing them out half price recently I picked one up, it's been in the system for a month now. Nice tweak and I am not much of a tweaker!
    • Blue Jeans Cable Bonded Pair Cat-6a ethernet cable
    From modem/router to my Aries and from my NAS to my router.
    • Deja Vu Audio Custom Pushpull 2a3 amp
    I was loaned this amp by Deja Vu when my own amp went in the shop, it's still there, and instantly fell in love with it. It's pushpull as the title says with dual power trasformers and vintage Eico output transformers. I am officially adding it to my system as I made the decision to keep it, as I suspected would happen all along. It sounds fantastic I love the sound of the 2a3 tube and pushing 15wpc it's a perfect match to my AN-J's.
    • Arcam FMJ-P35 Stereo Amp
    I acquired this little 100 watt Brit amp locally to use as an emergency backup locally for a very good price. I ran it in the system for a day to test it out and it sounds surprisingly good for a modest priced SS amp.
    • Wisdom Cable Technology Power Stage ES-10
    I've been looking for a new power distributor and this unit fit the bill nicely well constructed and sounds good too.
    • Yamamoto Soundcraft YDA-1 Dac
    My old friend is back bought back from the person I sold it too and happy to have my beloved Yamamoto returned to me.
    • Auralic ARIES G1
    I've finally upgraded my streamer my beloved Aries Mini served me faithfully for 6 years but I couldn't pass up the demo deal i got on this G1. Same great Auralic sound just a bit more of it. ;)
    • Wright Sound WPA-3.5 2a3 SET Monoblocks
    Found a great deal on these George Wright 2a3 monoblocks and they sound fantastic. Outfitted with NOS GE/Raytheon 2a3s, and some 60s RCA 6SN7's and RCA 5Y3 rectifiers. Sweet and transparent and dead quiet!
    • RCA Tube caddy
    Picked up this 60s era tube caddy and finally have my tubes sort of organized at least not all over the place!

Comments 196

Owner
Thank you @thinkinginventor123 I dropped some NOS JAN Phliips 6922s in the preamp last week the system is singing!

jond

I love all the tube gear! Really cozy looking, I'm sure everything sounds fabulous!

thinkinginventor123

Good to know,thank you

gregoriomtb16

Owner
Thanks @gregoriomtb16  and I would say they're more similar than different in that they both have a very direct sound nothing between you and the music. Also both excel at tonal color and musicality. The AN Dac I think was a bit better at longer decay of notes and maybe a bit of air between instruments but it's pretty close otherwise. Two outstanding Dacs for sure.

jond

Nice looking system.
What are the sonic differences between Audio Note dac and Yamamoto?

gregoriomtb16

Owner
@doyle3433 Thank you very much! Those are some impressive horns you're running!

jond

jond, I can't believe it's taken me this long to check out your set up! Well done brother! You clearly have an eye (and ear) for the detail. I'll bet it sounds sublime.

doyle3433

Owner
LMAO I sure did the redundant post thing alright!

jond

Owner
@lalitk Thank you it fills the space nicely and luckily I just share a single common wall and no one below. And I hope you get back to tubes hard for me to imagine not having them. And @ghosthouse thanks man you are welcome any time you're in DC. And that redundant post thing is happening a lot lately.

jond

Owner
@lalitk Thank you it fills the space nicely and luckily I just share a single common wall and no one below. And I hope you get back to tubes hard for me to imagine not having them. And @ghosthouse thanks man you are welcome any time you're in DC. And that redundant post thing is happening a lot lately.

jond

Owner
@lalitk Thank you it fills the space nicely and luckily I just share a single common wall and no one below. And I hope you get back to tubes hard for me to imagine not having them. And @ghosthouse thanks man you are welcome any time you're in DC. And that redundant post thing is happening a lot lately.

jond

Owner
@lalitk Thank you it fills the space nicely and luckily I just share a single common wall and no one below. And I hope you get back to tubes hard for me to imagine not having them. And @ghosthouse thanks man you are welcome any time you're in DC. And that redundant post thing is happening a lot lately.

jond

@jond, This is one hell of a system for 800sq ft apartment. I bet it’s not only sounds magical but keeps you warm during wintry nights. I do miss the sexy glow of tubes, maybe someday I can get back to an all tube system. Cheers!

lalitk

Error - redundant post

ghosthouse

Error - Redundant post.

ghosthouse

Hello jond - very obviously a system assembled on the basis of much thought and listening.  Would love to hear it one day.  Comfy looking room too.

ghosthouse

Owner
@herman Just letting you know I replied to your comment since I didn't use the @ function when I typed it. And I love your horns I am a big fan of horn speakers but no room to own them.

jond

Owner
Hey Herman I suspect you had an outlier and by guts I'm guessing you mean my older EL34 amp which was a bit of a rats nest inside. That being said neither that amp or my current 2a3 amp use cheap parts, its a nice mix of vintage and modern parts and good quality wire. And as far as output transformers my old amp used vintage Accrosound transformers and my current amp uses  vintage Eico transformers. Nothing from Hammond at all.

jond

Don't want to burst your bubble, but the DejaVu amplifier I once had was horrible. Looked like it was designed and built by a grade schooler who didn't have any idea what they were doing. The guts looked very similar to yours

It not only had some basic design flaws which limited performance, it was sloppily built with cheap components. It had the cheapest Hammond output transformers they offer with a bandwidth of around 100-10,000 Hz..I had to replace them with better transformers and rework the circuit to get them tp perform.

Maybe mine was an outlier, but if I were you I would want them checked by a competent tech who knows his way around tube amps and can test them for bandwidth and distortion




herman

Owner
Thanks Farmer and as they say there are many roads to happiness some are paved with tubes other with SS.

jond

You are a real tube guy. Very hard to get the beauty  out of soild  state gear that tubes can do in spades. Grand looking system. I am sure you could start teaching  me the basics  on tubes and then go up from there. Lol I am an infant  when it comes to tubes

retiredfarmer

Owner
Thank you edsel and nice beard!

jond

A very beautiful system.

edsel95

Owner
Thanks Barry I appreciate that and yes Deja Vu always kills at CAF I hope they attend this year!

jond

Jond, bet the system sound great!  I first heard Deja Vu stuff at the Capital Audiofest.and I was bowled over by the sound. Fantastic.  Enjoy it.

barrysandy

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