Do you need technical knowledge to consider Tube gear?

[Johnny Vinyl]

The more I read about tubes and it's gear the more I'm starting to believe that you need to have some sort of technical knowledge. As you all know, I have NONE o). For someone like me, and many other non-technophiles, would considering tube gear be a mistake without first learning about it? Or would it be ok to just take the plunge and learn as you go?


FYI - This is just a general question as I'm not considering any changes. I'm only trying to pick the brains of all the tube fans here.

 

[LL21]

Take the plunge...let's face it, a little knowledge is a dangerous thing in any field. In your own professional field of expertise, you probably already know this. Thus, being 'sort of an expert' might on occassion be worse than knowing nothing...and just letting your ears be your guide.

There a handful of 'rules' that can be good to know...and sometimes you dont even find they apply. Impedance loads between your amps and your preamp can matter...but generally there is a rule the output impedance should be, what is it?, ___% of the input impedance of the tube amp? Something like that. And of course, some speakers provide tougher loads than others, and not all tubes are capaable of handling...but then again, this is not a tube thing...all amps and speakers have a load-issue to consider.

Still, in the end, manufacturers know darn well there are tons of audiophiles who do not have techie knowledge...and to have a sustainable business will want to see their tube amps match with the majority of preamps, or speakers out there within reason. I say let your ears be your guide and enjoy!

 

[MylesBAstor]

Take the plunge...let's face it, a little knowledge is a dangerous thing in any field. In your own professional field of expertise, you probably already know this. Thus, being 'sort of an expert' might on occassion be worse than knowing nothing...and just letting your ears be your guide.

There a handful of 'rules' that can be good to know...and sometimes you dont even find they apply. Impedance loads between your amps and your preamp can matter...but generally there is a rule the output impedance should be, what is it?, ___% of the input impedance of the tube amp? Something like that. And of course, some speakers provide tougher loads than others, and not all tubes are capaable of handling...but then again, this is not a tube thing...all amps and speakers have a load-issue to consider.

Still, in the end, manufacturers know darn well there are tons of audiophiles who do not have techie knowledge...and to have a sustainable business will want to see their tube amps match with the majority of preamps, or speakers out there within reason. I say let your ears be your guide and enjoy!

Depends upon the company but for the bigger companies like cj, ARC or VTL, it's plug, bias and play. But what you're asking is something that your dealer should be able to help you with.

The only caveat is if you want to roll tubes and/or buy a tube tester to check your tubes.

 

[LL21]

Depends upon the company but for the bigger companies like cj, ARC or VTL, it's plug, bias and play. But what you're asking is something that your dealer should be able to help you with.

The only caveat is if you want to roll tubes and/or buy a tube tester to check your tubes.

True...in the case of tube rolling...i have found thought that experts (like you!) are really helpful...just ask! And speaking with Kevin at Upscale Audio, or Brent Jessee also is a great way to get great advice. i have ___ piece which uses ____ tubes...i want ____ kind of sound...and here is my budget...what do you suggest? Both Kevin and Brent have been great, along with many WBF members.

 

[Johnny Vinyl]

Lloyd - That's encouraging to read, and since I'm kind of a "let things fall as they may" or "throw caution to the wind" person, I'd be inclined to take the plunge. Maybe one day I can. Where do you employ tubes in your gear?

 

[LL21]

DAC and pre. I used to do tubed amps...but when i wanted to go high power...i went SS Class A instead and am not looking back (for now!).

 

[Johnny Vinyl]

DAC and pre. I used to do tubed amps...but when i wanted to go high power...i went SS Class A instead and am not looking back (for now!).

I've heard that SS Class A and tube pre is a wonderful combination. Almost like the best of both worlds.

 

[Johnny Vinyl]

Depends upon the company but for the bigger companies like cj, ARC or VTL, it's plug, bias and play. But what you're asking is something that your dealer should be able to help you with.

The only caveat is if you want to roll tubes and/or buy a tube tester to check your tubes.

Hi Myles

Would you recommend that a new tube gear owner buy extra tubes? Should they be identical to the ones in the unit or would third party tubes suffice?

 

[LL21]

Hi Myles

Would you recommend that a new tube gear owner buy extra tubes? Should they be identical to the ones in the unit or would third party tubes suffice?

Personally, i always buy a spare set...even if you sell the unit, you can usually find the new buyer will take those as well. I never like being without music...so keep a spare set handy. As for third party tubes, that is often a preference. Many units are stocked with readily available, lower cost tubes and sound great...but the manufacturer typically does not like using NOS tubes (New Old Stock) because they are more expensive, rarer (and therefore harder to consistently provide for all production units (and subsequent re-tubing)...but many audiophiles find these NOS tubes can improve sound.

In the case of CJ, i have found the CJ GAT to be less sensitive to tube rolling than other components i have owned. The stock tubes sound great, and i have tried Mullards as well as my favorite Amperex US PQ White Label...and in truth while i prefer these latter ones by a good margin...i could easily be happy with any.

 

[LL21]

I've heard that SS Class A and tube pre is a wonderful combination. Almost like the best of both worlds.

Yes, while many would seek same manufacturer for optimal imedpance matching between components, etc...i personally like this combination enough that my last 2 generations of pre/amps have been identifical. CJ ACT2/Gryphon Antileon and now CJ GAT/Gryphon Colosseum. I was fortunate to get all units second hand, so when i sold the first set, i actually made a bit of money which was kind of fun.

 

[DACMan]

Well, that depends on what you're hoping to get out of it.

There is an awful lot of bad information out there these days, and you can waste (er, spend) a lot of money on pure CRAP if you don't know what you're doing.

I'll admit, up front, that I know a LOT about tube equipment (I've owned it, repaired it, designed it), but I'm not especially a fan.

DO read this to the end...

"In the beginning", there was only tube equipment... and it wasn't very good (really)....
and the designers of it did their best to make it sound as good as possible (to reduce noise and distortion).
And, in fact, they got pretty good at it.
They came up with things like "push-pull" and "Williamson ultralinear circuits" to make the distortion low and the frequency response flat.
(Yes, children, people stopped using single ended triode amps a long time ago because push-pull ultralinear ones SOUNDED BETTER.)

Then solid state came along.
In the beginning solid state didn't sound all that good either (but it was cheap and didn't heat up the whole house).
Solid state gradually improved (but tubes were long dead since their disadvantages were myriad).
Solid state won that fight.

Now, due largely to a lot of nostalgia, tubes are BAAAAACK (say it like Jack Nicholson in The Shining).

All smartassing aside, tubes have a distinct sound - mostly due to their distortion characteristics.
The reality is that most good solid state designs make VERY low distortion, tubes more so.
Hardcore tube aficionados will insist that tubes have 'some magical something" and that they sound special
"in spite of the distortion instead of because of it".
The reality is that a typical SET (single-ended triode) amp makes 10% THD at ten watts -
even if there was something magical going on, how could you possibly hear it over all that distortion?

Personally, I don't care; and neither should you.
If you LIKE the way tubes sound, then, by all means, go for it.

The reason for the long story is this, however.....

MANY modern tube amplifiers sound rather bad.
What's happened is that, in order to pander to a market that doesn't know any better, the designers have
deliberately created bad designs that EXAGGERATE the "tube sound" because, presumably, their customers expect it.
Maybe, giving the benefit of the doubt, a lot of them just don't know how to design decent equipment.

As I said up front, I'm not personally a big fan of "tube sound" - although I do own a few tube headphone amps.
That said, a well designed piece of tube equipment can sound very good (especially if you like female vocals -
where the second harmonic distortion makes voices sound verrrryyy smooth).

There are simply lots of very expensive, very nicely made modern tube amps....
many using very good quality parts, and gorgeous to look at.... that don't sound good at all.
There is also a much wider VARIANCE between how various tube equipment sounds

Don't be fooled into thinking that they must be better because they cost a fortune, or because someone else likes them.
Don't assume that the super-expensive stuff sounds better than the cheaper stuff
(although some of the cheaper Chinese stuff is the worst for exaggerating "tube sound"
to the point where it sounds like someone poured syrup in your ears.)

Your best "starting point" might be to buy a piece of well-respected vintage equipment used...
just be sure to buy it from some place reputable with a warranty...
that way, if you don't like it, you can get back what you paid for it...
and if you LOVE it, and decide to move up, you can get back what you paid for it
and put it toward a better one.

If not, read the reviews, and read something that is at least well known and well liked.
(If you do headphones, a good tube headphone amp would be a good place to start.)


Keith

The more I read about tubes and it's gear the more I'm starting to believe that you need to have some sort of technical knowledge. As you all know, I have NONE o). For someone like me, and many other non-technophiles, would considering tube gear be a mistake without first learning about it? Or would it be ok to just take the plunge and learn as you go?


FYI - This is just a general question as I'm not considering any changes. I'm only trying to pick the brains of all the tube fans here.

 

[puroagave]

MANY modern tube amplifiers sound rather bad.
What's happened is that, in order to pander to a market that doesn't know any better, the designers have
deliberately created bad designs that EXAGGERATE the "tube sound" because, presumably, their customers expect it.
Maybe, giving the benefit of the doubt, a lot of them just don't know how to design decent equipment.

keith thats a bold statement, i guess i can be counted as one of the "i dont know any better" crowd. exactly how many pieces of recent tube gear have you owned and used in your own system not including what you have built, like CJ, ARC, VTL, manley, etc??

 

[MylesBAstor]

Well, that depends on what you're hoping to get out of it.

There is an awful lot of bad information out there these days, and you can waste (er, spend) a lot of money on pure CRAP if you don't know what you're doing.

I'll admit, up front, that I know a LOT about tube equipment (I've owned it, repaired it, designed it), but I'm not especially a fan.

DO read this to the end...

"In the beginning", there was only tube equipment... and it wasn't very good (really)....
and the designers of it did their best to make it sound as good as possible (to reduce noise and distortion).
And, in fact, they got pretty good at it.
They came up with things like "push-pull" and "Williamson ultralinear circuits" to make the distortion low and the frequency response flat.
(Yes, children, people stopped using single ended triode amps a long time ago because push-pull ultralinear ones SOUNDED BETTER.)

Then solid state came along.
In the beginning solid state didn't sound all that good either (but it was cheap and didn't heat up the whole house).
Solid state gradually improved (but tubes were long dead since their disadvantages were myriad).
Solid state won that fight.

Now, due largely to a lot of nostalgia, tubes are BAAAAACK (say it like Jack Nicholson in The Shining).

All smartassing aside, tubes have a distinct sound - mostly due to their distortion characteristics.
The reality is that most good solid state designs make VERY low distortion, tubes more so.
Hardcore tube aficionados will insist that tubes have 'some magical something" and that they sound special
"in spite of the distortion instead of because of it".
The reality is that a typical SET (single-ended triode) amp makes 10% THD at ten watts -
even if there was something magical going on, how could you possibly hear it over all that distortion?

Personally, I don't care; and neither should you.
If you LIKE the way tubes sound, then, by all means, go for it.

The reason for the long story is this, however.....

MANY modern tube amplifiers sound rather bad.
What's happened is that, in order to pander to a market that doesn't know any better, the designers have
deliberately created bad designs that EXAGGERATE the "tube sound" because, presumably, their customers expect it.
Maybe, giving the benefit of the doubt, a lot of them just don't know how to design decent equipment.

As I said up front, I'm not personally a big fan of "tube sound" - although I do own a few tube headphone amps.
That said, a well designed piece of tube equipment can sound very good (especially if you like female vocals -
where the second harmonic distortion makes voices sound verrrryyy smooth).

There are simply lots of very expensive, very nicely made modern tube amps....
many using very good quality parts, and gorgeous to look at.... that don't sound good at all.
There is also a much wider VARIANCE between how various tube equipment sounds

Don't be fooled into thinking that they must be better because they cost a fortune, or because someone else likes them.
Don't assume that the super-expensive stuff sounds better than the cheaper stuff
(although some of the cheaper Chinese stuff is the worst for exaggerating "tube sound"
to the point where it sounds like someone poured syrup in your ears.)

Your best "starting point" might be to buy a piece of well-respected vintage equipment used...
just be sure to buy it from some place reputable with a warranty...
that way, if you don't like it, you can get back what you paid for it...
and if you LOVE it, and decide to move up, you can get back what you paid for it
and put it toward a better one.

If not, read the reviews, and read something that is at least well known and well liked.
(If you do headphones, a good tube headphone amp would be a good place to start.)

Keith

While you're certainly entitled to your opinion, you are not correct that tubes went away when ss was released. I suggest you go back to Audio magazine's annual equipment guide from the 70s-80s-90s and count the number of tube amps and preamps. I know because I did and tube/hybrid units never comprised less than 60% of the models listed.

 

[jazdoc]

I'm probably the least technical person on WBF and I prefer tube gear. I enjoy the flexibility to tune the gear by tube rolling and the tubes I use are long lived -- on the order of 10,000 hours.

When I had an expensive solid state amplifier (by a well known manufacturer) go bad, it wasn't like I was going to look under the grill and fix it. It took two trips to the repair facility over the course of 9 months to things back to working order. Most tube circuits are relatively simple and most repairs could be repaired locally by a competent tech.

 

[Johnny Vinyl]

I'm probably the least technical person on WBF and I prefer tube gear. I enjoy the flexibility to tune the gear by tube rolling and the tubes I use are long lived -- on the order of 10,000 hours.

When I had an expensive solid state amplifier (by a well known manufacturer) go bad, it wasn't like I was going to look under the grill and fix it. It took two trips to the repair facility over the course of 9 months to things back to working order. Most tube circuits are relatively simple and most repairs could be repaired locally by a competent tech.

I'm offended by that comment! ROFLMAO!

 

[cjfrbw]

I've heard that SS Class A and tube pre is a wonderful combination. Almost like the best of both worlds.

Directly Heated Triode preamp and a good SS amp is surprisingly good, one of those "best of both worlds" type things. I think a DHT triode preamp and a SIT or VFET amp would be a near knockout punch for those who don't want to deal with tube amplification.

If I ever get my Sony TA 8650 working, I am going to try it with the Allnic DHT L5000 preamp and see what happens.

To answer the OP, yes, a certain amount of technical knowledge is going to be necessary with tube equipment, unless you have a "tube butler" at your disposal.

 

[Johnny Vinyl]

To answer the OP, yes, a certain amount of technical knowledge is going to be necessary with tube equipment, unless you have a "tube butler" at your disposal.

I kinda figured that, but then...I have my "butlers" right here. .

 

[microstrip]

Well, that depends on what you're hoping to get out of it.

There is an awful lot of bad information out there these days, and you can waste (er, spend) a lot of money on pure CRAP if you don't know what you're doing.

I'll admit, up front, that I know a LOT about tube equipment (I've owned it, repaired it, designed it), but I'm not especially a fan.

DO read this to the end...

"In the beginning", there was only tube equipment... and it wasn't very good (really)....
and the designers of it did their best to make it sound as good as possible (to reduce noise and distortion).
And, in fact, they got pretty good at it.
They came up with things like "push-pull" and "Williamson ultralinear circuits" to make the distortion low and the frequency response flat.
(Yes, children, people stopped using single ended triode amps a long time ago because push-pull ultralinear ones SOUNDED BETTER.)

Then solid state came along.
In the beginning solid state didn't sound all that good either (but it was cheap and didn't heat up the whole house).
Solid state gradually improved (but tubes were long dead since their disadvantages were myriad).
Solid state won that fight.

Now, due largely to a lot of nostalgia, tubes are BAAAAACK (say it like Jack Nicholson in The Shining).

All smartassing aside, tubes have a distinct sound - mostly due to their distortion characteristics.
The reality is that most good solid state designs make VERY low distortion, tubes more so.
Hardcore tube aficionados will insist that tubes have 'some magical something" and that they sound special
"in spite of the distortion instead of because of it".
The reality is that a typical SET (single-ended triode) amp makes 10% THD at ten watts -
even if there was something magical going on, how could you possibly hear it over all that distortion?

Personally, I don't care; and neither should you.
If you LIKE the way tubes sound, then, by all means, go for it.

The reason for the long story is this, however.....

MANY modern tube amplifiers sound rather bad.
What's happened is that, in order to pander to a market that doesn't know any better, the designers have
deliberately created bad designs that EXAGGERATE the "tube sound" because, presumably, their customers expect it.
Maybe, giving the benefit of the doubt, a lot of them just don't know how to design decent equipment.

As I said up front, I'm not personally a big fan of "tube sound" - although I do own a few tube headphone amps.
That said, a well designed piece of tube equipment can sound very good (especially if you like female vocals -
where the second harmonic distortion makes voices sound verrrryyy smooth).

There are simply lots of very expensive, very nicely made modern tube amps....
many using very good quality parts, and gorgeous to look at.... that don't sound good at all.
There is also a much wider VARIANCE between how various tube equipment sounds

Don't be fooled into thinking that they must be better because they cost a fortune, or because someone else likes them.
Don't assume that the super-expensive stuff sounds better than the cheaper stuff
(although some of the cheaper Chinese stuff is the worst for exaggerating "tube sound"
to the point where it sounds like someone poured syrup in your ears.)

Your best "starting point" might be to buy a piece of well-respected vintage equipment used...
just be sure to buy it from some place reputable with a warranty...
that way, if you don't like it, you can get back what you paid for it...
and if you LOVE it, and decide to move up, you can get back what you paid for it
and put it toward a better one.

If not, read the reviews, and read something that is at least well known and well liked.
(If you do headphones, a good tube headphone amp would be a good place to start.)


Keith

Keith,
Your post suffers from abusive use of words such as many and lots to create a tendency. If, as I admit you are, you are addressing some few specific bad designs that sound poor, you have a point. But in my opinion this is not the majority. But IMHO you should compare good SS with the best tube amplifiers, not the bad examples.

 

[MylesBAstor]

If that's true I wonder how his employer feels about that. We had this happen over at another forum. Didn't take long for the owners to chime in and give him a spanking. He no longer posts.

"...Was always an audio enthusiast, now I work for an audio equipment manufacturer (Emotiva)."

 

[Johnny Vinyl]

"...Was always an audio enthusiast, now I work for an audio equipment manufacturer (Emotiva)."

Embarrassed I didn't catch that. Thanks Myles!