Tube buffer. Yaqin?

[brijenjas]

I want to try some tube gear to see if I like the sound.

A tube buffer seems to be an relatively inexpensive way to do this.

I see some members here have used the Musical Fideltiy tube buffer with good results.

I was looking at the Yaqin tube buffer at The Pacific Valve and Electric Company. It uses a single tube. (6DJ8/6N11/6N1)
http://www.pacificvalve.us/YaqinTB.html

There is a 2 tube (6j1) version of the Yaqin also, but it only appears to be available from overseas.

I only found a few references to these on audio forums, opinions were favorable.

Has anyone here try one of these Yaqin buffers? Or have any opinion on tube buffers one way or the other?

[steveinaz]

Signal to Noise ratio seems to be fairly bad at 60dB...?

[Early B.]

I'd go with a used Musical Fidelity for about $250. You know it has good build quality, good reviews, excellent resale value, etc. With the Yaqin you don't know any of these, and the cost is not much different.

[brijenjas]

Signal to Noise ratio seems to be fairly bad at 60dB...?

I missed that somehow, quite a difference between the two units.

[brijenjas]

Although I value greatly the advice and input of you experienced members, I ordered the 2 tube Yaqin simply because it was $109.00 shipped to my door.

Should be here today, one week from Hong Kong.

[Danny Tse]

Although I value greatly the advice and input of you experienced members, I ordered the 2 tube Yaqin simply because it was $109.00 shipped to my door.

Should be here today, one week from Hong Kong.

Please update this thread when you get the tube buffers. I am interested in these things too.

[brijenjas]

Received this this afternoon.

It appears to be well made, the face of it is some kind of plexiglass about 3/8" thick, lots of screws holding the case together, nice rubber feet.

I put the stock tubes in and let it warm up for about 10 minutes before playing any music through it.

Played a few albums, the only difference I really noticed so far is that the vocals aren't as forward as without the buffer.
This is a good thing for me because the vocals on my system were a bit overpowering before,

From what I understand these need to break in for a while, I don't know how long, so I'll let it play for several hours and see if it sounds any different.

I have some GE 6AK5/EF95 tubes that are supposed to be compatible that I will try later this week.

[MillerLiteScott]

Does it add any noise?

And lets see some pics.

[brijenjas]

Does it add any noise?

And lets see some pics.

No noise that I could hear.

Will get some pics up later.

[brijenjas]

Sorry about the blurry pics.

[bchivers]

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[Shizelbs]

I would go with the Musical Fidelity. Top quality gear and 'proven' results with the tube buffer. If you need to save a little money, last time I checked there were a ton of them on the used market for a little below retail.

[mhardy6647]

Buy a good tube power amp or preamp rather than a buffer box to add distortion and nothing else. If you want to try "tube sound" cheap, see if PAIA still sells their "tubehead" kit.

www.paia.com

EDIT: Just MNSHO, of course (and there are plenty of tubes at my house, doing something more interesting than buffering. SS is fine for buffers, if you need one).

EDIT^2: Sorry the above all sounded snottier than necessary :-( Nonetheless, if I were going to spend a few hundred dollars to "taste tubes", I think I would buy one of the Scott 299 series, or an EICO HF-81, or even a lower-powered JoLida (if I wanted new production) and do it right. A well-implemented buffer (tube or solid state) really should have negligible audible impact.