[Farrellc]

Got my V8 yesterday and it's definitely a beast. Looks and feels great, but most importantly, it sounds great! Very clean and spacious with good imaging and positioning of instruments throughout the soundstage. I'll assume it's the improved noise filtering of the Level II at play, but this is easily the quietest tube amp I've owned - dead silent. As @vkenz said, it gets pretty hot, but it's what you would expect from all the power it's making.

Somewhat limited on tube combinations at the moment, but I just ordered some different pairs of 6080 and 12ay7 tubes which should arrive next week. For now, I'll just play around with what I've got and see what works best.

 

[The Piper]

Got my V8 yesterday and it's definitely a beast. Looks and feels great, but most importantly, it sounds great! Very clean and spacious with good imaging and positioning of instruments throughout the soundstage. I'll assume it's the improved noise filtering of the Level II at play, but this is easily the quietest tube amp I've owned - dead silent. As @vkenz said, it gets pretty hot, but it's what you would expect from all the power it's making.

Somewhat limited on tube combinations at the moment, but I just ordered some different pairs of 6080 and 12ay7 tubes which should arrive next week. For now, I'll just play around with what I've got and see what works best.

12ay7s will give it a sweeter, richer,fuller harmonic presentation. A touch more "tube" sounding for those that want a different sonic profile.

 

[ken6217]

deleted

 

[ed7090]

I dug out my Dragon lvl 1 recently and re-realize what a treasure it is. Crazy how many ppl slept on it... not gonna lie control like adjusting gain isn't as convenient as some highly commercial products out there which you can just flip without switching the amp off. But the sound quality itself is worth it.
All these days I was using the Cayin IHA6 the difference is night and day the thing that surprise me the most is that it really drives inefficient headphones and sensitive ones equally well, the finesse really is there. I have 2 extremes here - the AKG K240DF and Fostex TH600/900/909. Potential buyers - give em a shot.
Now my plan is to buy a decent preamp to pair with it so I can use the 2nd lv gain for all headphones(this gain lv sounded the best to me, smoothness, saturation just right).

 

[Ufanco]

I dug out my Dragon lvl 1 recently and re-realize what a treasure it is. Crazy how many ppl slept on it... not gonna lie control like adjusting gain isn't as convenient as some highly commercial products out there which you can just flip without switching the amp off. But the sound quality itself is worth it.
All these days I was using the Cayin IHA6 the difference is night and day the thing that surprise me the most is that it really drives inefficient headphones and sensitive ones equally well, the finesse really is there. I have 2 extremes here - the AKG K240DF and Fostex TH600/900/909. Potential buyers - give em a shot.
Now my plan is to buy a decent preamp to pair with it so I can use the 2nd lv gain for all headphones(this gain lv sounded the best to me, smoothness, saturation just right).

My Dragon is being serviced and really missing it. Hopefully hear back soon on status of repair. I picked up a Musical Paradise MP 701 Mark II preamp to pair with it.

 

[elira]

My Dragon is being serviced and really missing it. Hopefully hear back soon on status of repair. I picked up a Musical Paradise MP 701 Mark II preamp to pair with it.

What was wrong with it?