Thread: Tubed Power Amplifiers. Are the disadvantages too great ?

Originally Posted by dlb2

Yes, if it sounds good to you then it is good. There's nothing wrong with having a curiosity towards the technical side. Like any hobby perhaps the more you know and understand, the more you appreciate it. At the end of the day it's all about whether or not you're happy with what you have. Who really gives a shit what other people think? Besides, I have a feeling that many of these know-it-alls are just armchair internet experts.

Sales guys irritate me when they say I have to have such and such. Especially speakers. I like my open baffle and Magnepans. Plus tubes. One guy keeps telling me I don't know what I like and need a boxed speaker with a SS amp. I haven't bought anything from him in a long time.

Originally Posted by dlb2

Yes, if it sounds good to you then it is good. There's nothing wrong with having a curiosity towards the technical side. Like any hobby perhaps the more you know and understand, the more you appreciate it. At the end of the day it's all about whether or not you're happy with what you have. Who really gives a shit what other people think? Besides, I have a feeling that many of these know-it-alls are just armchair internet experts.

Sales guys irritate me when they say I have to have such and such. Especially speakers. I like my open baffle and Magnepans. Plus tubes. One guy keeps telling me I don't know what I like and need a boxed speaker with a SS amp. I haven't bought anything from him in a long time.

You don't know what you like! LOL! He probably trying to sell you what makes him the most money. He doesn't care what it is. Maybe he's working on a plan to pay off the new car he has on order.

Originally Posted by Joseph R.

Had a thought yesterday about tubed power amps. I have many friends who will never consider a solid state power amplifier. I am not one of them. I certainly understand the fluidity and “beauty” of tube gear. Nevertheless, considering the great solid state amps out there, the question stands.

For me the question is, Are the advantages of tuba amps to few?

Folks like tube amps because of the sort of distortion the produce -- not that there's anything wrong with that. OTOH other folks like high resolution, articulate bass, and crisp dynamics more than the softer, fuller tube sound.

I've run big tube amps (8 - 12 power tubes, and 6 - 8 small tubes each) for 12 years now. Tubes turned out to be much more reliable and low-maintenance than the impressions I got from reading about tube concerns / issues / fears online. My main main problem is the impulse to buy lots of different variants for rolling. The sonic debate tubes vs. SS is always going to be there. The stereotypes are true to a degree, but if your tube amp has egregiously tubby bass and HF rolloff then something is seriously wrong of mismatched. But I'd much rather have a tube die than a transistor, in any piece of high-end gear. Good luck finding some long-OOP silicon (especially high voltage audio transistors) if something goes wrong.

Originally Posted by stereogeek

I only need about 15wpc so I called Mike the other day and was going to order a Luxman MQ-88uC. The trouble is they are many months away for delivery, I still might order one in the next week or so anyway. In the meantime I ordered a Carver Black Magic, it's an EL34 amp with 25wpc. I seriously don't have real high hopes for this amp but for $1995 and a full return policy I won't have much to lose. But then again I didn't high hopes for the little VTL EL34 amp I bought many years ago either and that thing was a very sweet little amp.

Hope you find what you're looking for.

Gotta chuckle though: Luxman and Carver tube amps have both received atrocious reviews recently at ASR.

ASR review: Luxman SQ-N150

ASR review: Carver Crimson 275

ASR review: VTL

Originally Posted by Feanor

Hope you find what you're looking for.

Gotta chuckle though: Luxman and Carver tube amps have both received atrocious reviews recently at ASR.

ASR review: Luxman SQ-N150

ASR review: Carver Crimson 275

ASR review: VTL

So you place stock in what ASR says about gear?

Originally Posted by mep

So you place stock in what ASR says about gear?

So well yes, I do: their testing is valid. However one has to interpret their findings in terms of one's own preferences.

Originally Posted by Feanor

So well yes, I do: their testing is valid. However one has to interpret their findings in terms of one's own preferences.

That's hilarious.

Originally Posted by mep

That's hilarious.

are you saying there's no validity ? if so who's testing do you consider valid ?

Originally Posted by Mikado463

are you saying there's no validity ? if so who's testing do you consider valid ?

Amir/ASR's measurements have been discussed on the net including this forum. The best we have for taking measurements of audio gear in the U.S. is John Atkinson of Stereophile. JA is well respected/trusted in the audio industry.

Originally Posted by stereogeek;351031[B

]I have been involved in hobby since about 1969 or so and I don't care how anything tests. If you can't tell a good piece of[/B] gear by listening save your money and purchase Bose. BTW, I do agree that Atkinson is the best tester because he explains his findings. BTW #2, My speakers ( Volti Razz ) test horrible but sound excellent and get rave reviews. How is this possible if they test so poorly?

That sounds good to say, but the reality is you should care about speaker measurements to ensure you match them with an amp that can drive them correctly.

If you have a pair of speakers that are 87dB sensitive at 1w/1m and they are nominally a 4 ohm speaker with 2 ohm dips, you probably aren't going to try and drive them with a 7 watt SE tube amp.

Originally Posted by mep

Amir/ASR's measurements have been discussed on the net including this forum. The best we have for taking measurements of audio gear in the U.S. is John Atkinson of Stereophile. JA is well respected/trusted in the audio industry.

Agreed on JA, been a subscriber to JGH's rag since the seventies. While I have not read everything AMIR and ASR have tested/measured I've read enough to know there is a measure of validity in his work.

As for Stereogeek's thoughts on not caring about measurements and since this thread is about amplifiers , I tend to disagree

Originally Posted by AJ Soundfield

Worldwide space programs long abandoned solid state hardware for audiophile tube technology, especially in deep space probes. Believe me.

Surprisingly, there are still tubes being launched in satellites, of the traveling wave tube type. For any frequency, there is a power level above which tubes are best, and for any power level, there is a frequency above which tubes work best.

It's always about finding the right tool for a particular job. I wouldn't want to make a cell phone with tubes, and I wouldn't want to make a preamp, compressor, etc., without them. Your mileage may vary; whatever you have is serving you well as long as you're enjoying the music!

Originally Posted by stereogeek

I have been involved in hobby since about 1969 or so and I don't care how anything tests. If you can't tell a good piece of gear by listening save your money and purchase Bose. BTW, I do agree that Atkinson is the best tester because he explains his findings. BTW #2, My speakers ( Volti Razz ) test horrible but sound excellent and get rave reviews. How is this possible if they test so poorly?

The human ear/brain is a non-linear system, works completely differently than our test instruments. As a result, there are things that are easy to measure and hard to hear, and things that are easy to hear and hard to measure. This makes good audio engineering both a science and an art. My take is that a component must measure sufficiently well that you are confident you are not hearing an objective aberration, and then must also subjectively sound quite lifelike. Of course, this is easier with electronics than with speaker design!

Originally Posted by VAC

The human ear/brain is a non-linear system, works completely differently than our test instruments. As a result, there are things that are easy to measure and hard to hear, and things that are easy to hear and hard to measure. This makes good audio engineering both a science and an art. My take is that a component must measure sufficiently well that you are confident you are not hearing an objective aberration, and then must also subjectively sound quite lifelike. Of course, this is easier with electronics than with speaker design!

well said !!