Tape Op Magazine mod to Paia tube mic preamp

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I had a subscription to Tape Op, but didn't renew it. Too much subjectivity, not enough science.
Anyway, how could one expect to make a preamp with a 5532-based diff amp and a starved ECC83 perform brilliantly?
You can't polish the proverbial turd.
Replacing capacitors, particularly the input and output ones could bring some improvement on distortion, but isn't using a starving tube a deliberate attempt at creating distortion?
The whole concept is flawed from the start.
I'm not saying it's unusable, and I don't doubt there are satisfied users, but you could say the same of a Panda; it will never turn into a Beemer.
The mod for DC-powering the heaters is pathetic.
 
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I built this back in 1998 and it sounds ok for what it is. I'm not here to promote the design or debate it's merits. I just need to clarify something in the article that appears to be in error. The DC power mod, to be specific. If no one here has done this mod, I'll just replace the other parts and see if there is any improvement.
 
The Paia Tube Head was one of the very first things I ever built -- quite some time ago. The Mic Pre uses the same 'trick' as the Tube head. It's not supposed to be a pristine high-tech tube design, but rather follows a stompbox approach. Here's what their webs say about the starved plate design:

is a low-cost, two-channel vacuum tube pre-amplifier with a twist — it’s designed to be adjustable from crisp, solid-state transparency to an exaggerated caricature of tube amp warmth.
(emphasis mine)

No more and no less. It drives the parallel-pathed tube into soft clipping (distortion / limiting) and it indeed does it quite nicely -- as an effect.

The circuit itself is pretty sparse and simple. But whatever you do to it (power bypass caps maybe?), of course it will not turn into a high-end unit, cos it was never meant to be one. It's an effects unit and can sound pretty cool on some / too harsh stuff ;) It sees some use here once in a while, exactly for that 'caricature' sound. I don't need/ want it to sound clean
 
Yup, I had a dual that was powered by two wall worts glued back to back. :D It was on loan and I could never bring myself around to track anything with it but it was fun discovering that some of the LEDs were installed backwards.

I must have messed with the bias for hours to no avail. I didn't bother replacing the caps. I moved on to heavier metal.
 

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