Members willsellout Posted June 1, 2008 Members Share Posted June 1, 2008 Is there such a thing as purely a tube power amp without a pre section? I've resorted to looking at audiophile amplifiers... Yeah, Aguilar made one. 400 watts tube power. No longer made and expensive but it's the only one I know of.Dan Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Mudbass Posted June 1, 2008 Members Share Posted June 1, 2008 Congratulations. Feels good, don't it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderators Kindness Posted June 1, 2008 Moderators Share Posted June 1, 2008 Demeter also makes an all tube power amp. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members LanEvo Posted June 1, 2008 Members Share Posted June 1, 2008 I don't know... tubes have never sounded good to me. I just can't dig the amount of color they give the sound.Come to my place one day and listen to your favorite vinyl or CDs through my Decware SE34M dual monoblock amps, based on the single-ended triode (SET) architecture. Edited: Here's an older pic of my system. Besides the Decware monoblocks, there's a Pro-Ject RPM4 turntable, Antique Sound Labs (ASL) Mini Phono, and home-brew interconnects. You can't see my vintage ADS L710 speakers (original Braun drivers with butyl rubber surrounds) or NAD CD player. The ASL has recently been replaced by a Rega phono stage, which I find has deeper bass. All in all, the system is amazingly transparent and detailed. The imaging is off the charts. I have yet to hear a solid state system do what a good SET amp-based system can do. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members LanEvo Posted June 1, 2008 Members Share Posted June 1, 2008 Here is an example http://www.jolida.com/catalogue/tubeamp.shtmlNot sure I'd agree. Jolida is fine for what it is, but there is better stuff available for not much more money. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members i_wanna_les_paul Posted June 1, 2008 Members Share Posted June 1, 2008 Come to my place one day and listen to your favorite vinyl or CD through my Decware SE34M dual monoblock amps, based on the classic single-end triode (S.E.T.) architechture. Dude...does it have an iPod dock? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Guttermouth Posted June 1, 2008 Members Share Posted June 1, 2008 Yup, I sold the beast (Peavey Classic 400) I'm sure I'll miss it, it was a truly outrageous bass head... but WAY more power then I've ever needed. I spent the early 90s making a living at bass with an AMP BH-250 and a pair of Bag End cabs... well now I have a single Bag End cab with 2x12" and I've just bought a recently refurbed AMP BH-250 off a guy on TB. FYI: the AMP BH-250 is the red headed step brother to the rest of the AMP line... top dog being the BH-420 which spawned the Thunderfunk line of amps (Dave Funk bought the design from Gibson who bought it from AMP as they went under). The Designers of the AMP line went on to start new companies like SWR and Eden... and they came from the world of the Acoustic Corp in the 70s. james , are there any huge tonal differences between the bh250 and 420? i don't think i would be stressing too bad over a tube amp if i had an a.m.p. kicking around - they are killer heads Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members GreaserMatt Posted June 1, 2008 Members Share Posted June 1, 2008 I like tubes for bass and guitar.... but I also like solid state... actually just like good amps cool cool +1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members GreaserMatt Posted June 1, 2008 Members Share Posted June 1, 2008 I seriously believe my huge old dinosaur Fender tube head is as clean, clear, and musical as any solid state amp I've owned. Well, more musical, really. Granted I haven't owned a $58,586 SuperUltra Wondergizmo Amp, made in Bavaria by Elves, so I'm not claiming it's the most hi-fi thing there is, but for me it does the trick. Meh, their overrated, LOL Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members GreaserMatt Posted June 1, 2008 Members Share Posted June 1, 2008 Keep your eyes on NYC craigslist. They pop up from time to time. I remember one for around $125 in Westchester a while back. Wow! Good deal... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members knuckle_head Posted June 1, 2008 Members Share Posted June 1, 2008 So, geeks.... Is there a benefit to SE rather than push/pull power? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Guttermouth Posted June 1, 2008 Members Share Posted June 1, 2008 So, geeks.... Is there a benefit to SE rather than push/pull power? it depends on what you're playing through it. personally, ( design differences aside) i like ul push pull for bass - they just seem to hold together better. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members LanEvo Posted June 1, 2008 Members Share Posted June 1, 2008 Is there a benefit to SE rather than push/pull power?For an instrument amp, I would not expect a SET amp to offer any real advantages. The extra power of a push/pull amp would make more sense to me in that context. In a Hi-Fi setting, a good SET amp has very noticeably more natural mids, which makes voices, guitars, and horns really jump out at you. There's a very real sense of a 3D soundscape: you would not believe the imaging and detail. Distortion is very low...until you run into clipping (pretty easy to do when running 2.5 watts per channel). With highly efficient speakers, however, I never run into clipping unless I'm really cranking the volume up to levels that would have the neighbors knocking on the walls. But even with the "massive" 5 watts from my monoblocks, I will sometimes run into clipping even at moderate volumes if there's a ton of low-end information (like a Bjork or Daft Punk album). I think a SET amp and efficient speakers work excellently for some types of music, especially jazz albums with live-sounding vocals and acoustic instruments. But almost anything recorded "well" (i.e., without excessive compression and with a relatively natural sound) works great. Off the top of my head, my system sounds great when I'm listening to Stevie Wonder, Radiohead, Beck, Marvin Gaye, the new Paul McCartney album, D'Angelo, Dire Straits, Joni Mitchell, Mike Watt, Morphine, The Police, White Stripes, etc. etc. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members knuckle_head Posted June 1, 2008 Members Share Posted June 1, 2008 Two more... Does an SE amp care whether you give it a balanced or unbalanced signal? Is it possible to have an SE amp dole out 100 watts? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Thumper Posted June 1, 2008 Members Share Posted June 1, 2008 No tubes?That's like saying you lost your Man Card...Good luck with the Kindness' Rig. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members James Hart Posted June 1, 2008 Author Members Share Posted June 1, 2008 james , are there any huge tonal differences between the bh250 and 420? i don't think i would be stressing too bad over a tube amp if i had an a.m.p. kicking around - they are killer heads completely different style of pre... no parametric, different signal path, etc. It was voiced / designed by the same cats so it's in a similar vein. I had played my BH250 + BE mini-stack at showcase shows in the 90s against guys with Sunn, GK and Ampeg stacks... ALWAYS smoked them in tone, volume and air pressure. I was honestly GAS free for about 7 years of gigging. I only sold the AMP and Bag Ends because I quit the biz for a couple years and needed the cash to head back to school.So yeah, they are killer heads Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Guttermouth Posted June 1, 2008 Members Share Posted June 1, 2008 completely different style of pre... no parametric, different signal path, etc. It was voiced / designed by the same cats so it's in a similar vein. I had played my BH250 + BE mini-stack at showcase shows in the 90s against guys with Sunn, GK and Ampeg stacks... ALWAYS smoked them in tone, volume and air pressure. I was honestly GAS free for about 7 years of gigging. I only sold the AMP and Bag Ends because I quit the biz for a couple years and needed the cash to head back to school. really? i don't guess i've ever paid much attention to the 250. i'll have to keep my eyes open for one then. btw - you've got mail headed your way Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members walkerci Posted June 1, 2008 Members Share Posted June 1, 2008 No tube = unhappy man. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members L. Ron Hoover Posted June 2, 2008 Members Share Posted June 2, 2008 Two more... Does an SE amp care whether you give it a balanced or unbalanced signal? Is it possible to have an SE amp dole out 100 watts? 1) Single-ended amps are by nature unbalanced so you'd have to convert to unbalanced, though there are ways of doing balanced amps that are fully Class-A. Most preamp circuitry is pure class A and lots of them are variations on single ended amps.2) Yes, but not with conventional audio tubes. WAVAC Labs makes a 150W single-ended triode amp using an RF broadcast tube run at 1200V... Pretty impressive but a pair of them costs $350k...The problem with single-ended Class A amps is that they're woefully inefficient; like typically 20%. At 20% efficiency, a 100W class-A amp would constantly dissipate 400W as heat. It'd be a pretty good space heater. It would also weigh 500 pounds. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members knuckle_head Posted June 2, 2008 Members Share Posted June 2, 2008 Well that narrows things down a bit... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members L. Ron Hoover Posted June 2, 2008 Members Share Posted June 2, 2008 For an instrument amp, I would not expect a SET amp to offer any real advantages. The extra power of a push/pull amp would make more sense to me in that context.In a Hi-Fi setting, a good SET amp has very noticeably more natural mids, which makes voices, guitars, and horns really jump out at you. There's a very real sense of a 3D soundscape: you would not believe the imaging and detail. Distortion is very low...until you run into clipping (pretty easy to do when running 2.5 watts per channel). With highly efficient speakers, however, I never run into clipping unless I'm really cranking the volume up to levels that would have the neighbors knocking on the walls. But even with the "massive" 5 watts from my monoblocks, I will sometimes run into clipping even at moderate volumes if there's a ton of low-end information (like a Bjork or Daft Punk album).I think a SET amp and efficient speakers work excellently for some types of music, especially jazz albums with live-sounding vocals and acoustic instruments. But almost anything recorded "well" (i.e., without excessive compression and with a relatively natural sound) works great. Off the top of my head, my system sounds great when I'm listening to Stevie Wonder, Radiohead, Beck, Marvin Gaye, the new Paul McCartney album, D'Angelo, Dire Straits, Joni Mitchell, Mike Watt, Morphine, The Police, White Stripes, etc. etc. SETs do some things exceptionally well. Like you said, awesome on vocals and other midrange/high frequency oriented instruments. I find that they rather fail at bass though. Part of it is just lack of power but SE amps tend to have high output impedance which means that they have a significant Ohm's law interaction with most speakers, which tends to give anemic or sometimes tubby bass. We solved this by designing a 3-way actively crossed-over system using 300B SETs to drive the mids and tweeters and 100W SS power amps for the woofers... Best of both worlds. You still get that wonderful SET midrange and HF with solid, controlled bass from the SS amps. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members knuckle_head Posted June 2, 2008 Members Share Posted June 2, 2008 SETs do some things exceptionally well. Like you said, awesome on vocals and other midrange/high frequency oriented instruments. I find that they rather fail at bass though. Part of it is just lack of power but SE amps tend to have high output impedance which means that they have a significant Ohm's law interaction with most speakers, which tends to give anemic or sometimes tubby bass.We solved this by designing a 3-way actively crossed-over system using 300B SETs to drive the mids and tweeters and 100W SS power amps for the woofers... Best of both worlds. You still get that wonderful SET midrange and HF with solid, controlled bass from the SS amps. Where'd you cross over for the woofers? This is where I'm headed... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members James Hart Posted June 2, 2008 Author Members Share Posted June 2, 2008 really? i don't guess i've ever paid much attention to the 250. i'll have to keep my eyes open for one then. btw - you've got mail headed your way replied!Here is the majority of the product line3rd from the bottom is the BH-250. It's a dual channel set up. one with just a bass - mid - treble - volume and the other is the same with an added 'edge' control that isn't really an OD or distortion but adds a slight bite with some tone enhancement to the over all tone. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members L. Ron Hoover Posted June 2, 2008 Members Share Posted June 2, 2008 Where'd you cross over for the woofers?This is where I'm headed... The acoustic crossover point is at 320Hz. The only reason that this works is that we're using a very sensitive midrange driver (98dB, probably 101 in the box), relative to the other drivers, so it makes effective use of the 5 or so Watts available from the 300B. I don't think that this approach or any SET approach, really, is practical for bass amplification. It just won't go loud enough for stage use. Maybe for a studio setup. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Enderz13 Posted June 2, 2008 Members Share Posted June 2, 2008 White Rabbit kicked ass. Loved your tone:thu: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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