Hey, I recently picked up the TA-22 as well. I will probably be trading it for the TA-20 Plus and getting a seperate dac/amp strictly for gaming. I tried gaming on the stock tubes and it was horrible, the mids sounded extremely muffled compared to my Zen Dac, which was really confusing because every review I saw mentioned that the stock tubes would get the job done...
Anyway, I got a pair of used RCA Clear Tops. It was a night and day difference. I'm not the biggest audiophile out there by any means. I just got a pair of amperex short plate O-getter's today, and they seem significantly more balanced and a good all-purpose choice. In my opinion, the stock tubes were super bass heavy, so much so that everything else sounded kinda wonky. If you're going to be listening to music, I strongly recommend the RCA clear tops. There was just something about them... I sat and listened to music for hours and I never do that. They sounded great across most genres (I'm mainly a rap guy, but I found myself listening to alternative and R&B). If you want a do-it-all kind of tube, I'd recommend trying out the Amperex. (I'm new to tubes myself, and I'm sure I'll order more in the coming days)
FYSA, I'm using LCD-2 Closed Backs primarily.
Side question: Do you happen to notice that your SE output is just a hair louder than balanced XLR? I found someone else on the head-fi forum saying they experienced the exact same thing. I'm a newbie when it comes to most things audiophile, but I always assumed that balanced should be noticeably louder, which was the case on my zen dac.
Hey, I recently picked up the TA-22 as well. I will probably be trading it for the TA-20 Plus and getting a seperate dac/amp strictly for gaming. I tried gaming on the stock tubes and it was horrible, the mids sounded extremely muffled compared to my Zen Dac, which was really confusing because every review I saw mentioned that the stock tubes would get the job done...
Anyway, I got a pair of used RCA Clear Tops. It was a night and day difference. I'm not the biggest audiophile out there by any means. I just got a pair of amperex short plate O-getter's today, and they seem significantly more balanced and a good all-purpose choice. In my opinion, the stock tubes were super bass heavy, so much so that everything else sounded kinda wonky. If you're going to be listening to music, I strongly recommend the RCA clear tops. There was just something about them... I sat and listened to music for hours and I never do that. They sounded great across most genres (I'm mainly a rap guy, but I found myself listening to alternative and R&B). If you want a do-it-all kind of tube, I'd recommend trying out the Amperex. (I'm new to tubes myself, and I'm sure I'll order more in the coming days)
FYSA, I'm using LCD-2 Closed Backs primarily.
Side question: Do you happen to notice that your SE output is just a hair louder than balanced XLR? I found someone else on the head-fi forum saying they experienced the exact same thing. I'm a newbie when it comes to most things audiophile, but I always assumed that balanced should be noticeably louder, which was the case on my zen dac.