I'm going to buy some new caps to replace the 38 year old caps in my Heathkit/Altec AS-101s (Altec Valencias with Heathkit Cabinets and Crossovers). I'm probably going to buy the Daytons but they have two types of Dayton Caps for speakers at Parts Express. One is the standard Metallized Polypropylene Caps that they've been selling for years rated at a 5% tolerance. They now have a new line of caps for speakers called Precision Audio Metallized Polypropylene Caps which are rated at 1% tolerance "which can eliminate ?stereo wandering? and solidify the imaging and soundstage of your speaker systems." Anyone out there used these new Dayton caps yet? They're not much more expensive--wondering if they'll sound at least as good as the "standard" Daytons. I've been told the standard Daytons will sound better than the Solens?
A cap mfr rolls out a production lot of caps, all intended to be a specific value. Then they're tested and graded, and the ones that are within 1% of value get labeled 1% and so on down the line. 1% tolerance is only better in that you can count on it being closer to the label value than a 5%. The rest is just adman BS.
"[I]We're going all the way, till the wheels fall off and burn[/I]!"
Bob Dylan, from [I]Brownsville Girl[/I]
[I]"Time wounds all heels"[/I]
John Lennon, referring to the Nixon/Hoover deportation fiasco.
What he said.Originally Posted by bfish
5% is better than most, I wouldn't worry about it.
If you are going to a lot of effort for something elaborate, the 1% may be justified.
Likely the same part, just they pick out the best and sell as 1%, the rest get sold as 5%.
Your neighbors called. They like your music.
Yeah, once upon a time I could tell you the manufacturers of the individual components of power (paper in oil (PIO) filled) caps (the only analog choice for truly HIFI performance) and there was a grand total of one each, so the only difference between brands was in the outer casing for a given set of electrical specs and manufacturing tolerances. I guess one can argue that different casings might audibly affect a speaker's performance same as a wire's insulation, but it's all just a 'power of suggestion' perception in my experience.
Anyway, here's some good info on capacitor performance:
Hometown Has Been Shutdown - People Connection Blog: AIM Community Network
Humble Homemade Hifi
R&D page
GM
Loud is Beautiful if it's Clean! As always though, the usual disclaimers apply to this post's contents.
GM,
Thanks for the links,,,,,,
-chris
Ugh! Posted and left without proofreading it: http://greygum.net/sbench/sbench102/caps.html
GM
Loud is Beautiful if it's Clean! As always though, the usual disclaimers apply to this post's contents.
Great links--this gives me a lot to consider. Thanks!
"Another conclusion is that during listening you rapidly gets used to the character of a certain filter. After switching back to the REF, the results can be rather overwhelming, knocking you straight off your feet at times. Even to a point where the REF start sounding... colored! This process can happen within minutes! It happened to us in several occasions."
I find this part of the R&D link interesting. I have heard before that the same thing happens with visual memory, that even the best of artists cannot "hold" a color in their memory and match it back up over time. I don't actually have a test reference for that, I've just heard it. Possibly the same is true aurally. Not to say that getting used to hearing defects or distortions is good, just that it happens.
I suspect the original caps were 20% tolerance, so considering that 5% is a considerable improvement.
Dave
"When words fail, music speaks" - HC Anderson
"I find this part of the R&D link interesting. I have heard before that the same thing happens with visual memory, that even the best of artists cannot "hold" a color in their memory and match it back up over time. I don't actually have a test reference for that, I've just heard it."
I don't know. If you're ever in Amsterdam, take a trip to the Rijksmuseum that holds the Rembrandt portraits. You can view some of them from as little as a couple of feet away. That guy had color memory, spatial memory, as well. The painting of the Burghers (?) is painted from the viewpoint of being almost under the table and the light is something else.
As to the Daytons: The regular poly caps work good for me.
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