Bottle head crack looks like a lot of fun, tbh. I’ll have to keep it in mind and look up some more reviews on it.
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I have the ZDT Jr. I like it, but I don’t know that I have found the best tubes for it, and the tubes themselves are really difficult to remove. I need to do a little more research on it. I’ve noticed that Drop really hasn’t had it since I purchased mine back in June. When I bought it, it was one of those in-stock products that shipped next-day, so I assumed this would be readily available like most of their other audio collaborations. I know they had issues with the initial batch, but they were resolved by the time I picked mine up. For my ears, the Darkvoice offers a wider soundstage and a more pronounced tube sound, but again, I may not have found the best tube combo for the ZDT Jr
Bottlehead amps are pretty great, and are also pretty fun to build
Depending on how this fishy ebay sale goes… I may end up going for the bottlehead crack. How’s the sound on it compare to the dark voice with stock tubes?
You could take a look at this thread over at head Fi if you haven’t already. Seems like some good tube rolling info in there.
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A lot of people say that the bottle head crack is pretty much endgame worthy as far as OTL tube hp amps go
As far as stock tubes… I’m sure the crack has better ones. The darkvoice tubes are cheap Chinese knockoffs and don’t sound too great compared to some of the good nos tubes you can buy
Yes, if you want a more sonically ready out of the box, the bottlehead might be the way to go (as long as you get the prebuilt lol, otherwise it will not be ready out of the box at all)
“Pretty much endgame” you say…WELL then… that might likely be the direction I go in…
Welllllllllll that’s pretty subjective. I never was a super huge fan of bottlehead gear, but it is pretty good
Haha. I will likely opt for the DIY kit. Not an expert by any means… but I’ve done as much as repair some vintage hardware, including a Sony PVM, so I think it will be “doable”.
Also pretty fun too as long as you know how to solder and stuff about basic electronics
yeah, no problems with soldering.
What is your take, Mon, on the bottlehead sound?
Thanks for that. I did swap out the two front tubes, but the rear tubes are so snug that I’m afraid that I will break them if I apply any more force when trying to remove them. The stock tubes are Russian I believe, and from what I had read, were pretty decent. Definitely sounded acceptable out of the box, where the stock Darkvoice tubes did not. But part of the fun in having a tube amp is the tube rolling, and the Darkvoice, and hopefully the La Figaro, make that activity a lot easier
It’s pretty much what you would want a tube to do lol, mess with the sound alot and be very pleasing. I think it’s great for someone who likes to tinker and mess around with swapping tubes. The darkvoice is the same way, but I personally think the bottlehead is a bit better quality if you don’t mind building one.
I don’t think I would say endgame worthy (as 1stly there is no endgame lol, and 2nd I think there are tube amps more capable that still mess with the sound but have a higher degree of fidelity). Still great tho
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Check these out, I have a DV and really enjoy it, I’m looking for something different myself just to play with and take up more room on my desk.
http://www.musicalparadise.ca/store/index.php?route=product/product&path=59&product_id=54
https://www.monoprice.com/product?p_id=33305
And some more reading material for you, sooo many Choices…
https://www.innerfidelity.com/category/vacuum-tube-home-headphone-amplifier-reviews
The glow audio stuff is pretty nice too, but I would say stepping into another price bracket.
I actually just picked up my 1st tube amp, as it’s a tube amp that I actually really really enjoyed. I mainly was not super interested in tube amps for the longest time. I thought they were nice but didn’t think I would want one. I was going to go for the audiovalve, but I actually got the cayin ha-300 because I liked it way more
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Dang, that Ha-300 looks sexy… #mustbenice 
It is so far, it even works well on planars (to an extent). Just takes up alot of space. I had to stack the separate power supply on top of the main amp horizontally for space savings, which I’m sure is not the recommended placement lol
That Cayin is awesome. If I’m buying a tube amp, I want to see the tubes and all their glowy goodness. I definitely prefer the look to that of the Audiovalve. The one thing the Audiovalve has going for it is that it also powers electrostatics, but if I had to choose between the two on aesthetics alone, I would go with the Cayin. I love those big 300B tubes
That was one of the reasons I was considering the audiovalve, because I have just been getting into estats recently because I never could get past the strange timbre, but now I think there are some good offerings with less offensive timbre. I ended up also just getting an iesl though, so I can still use my cayin with it, and all my other solid state amps