Tube vs Solid State Is the War

[Orb]

I don't think Dr. Geddes, with degrees in physics and acoustics has any more validity in commenting on electronics than the chemistry guys do...well, maybe a little...at least acoustics is related, and I'll bet he has tested his own speakers with a lot of amps and knows what they're supposed to sound like. That's pretty valuable.

But the guys who have big cred regarding the audibility of electronics are those who have specifically tested the audibility of electronics (duh), with the deepest cred going to the very few, like Sean Olive, who are doing daily, extensive, carefully controlled research in the subject. You have the quantifiable, repeatable and verifiable and you have "I hear X." The latter is fine. You hear what you hear and I want you to enjoy it. But it's an opinion. The former is data. Imperfect, perhaps. Unproven in any absolute sense, maybe, but meaningful beyond one listener with his eyes wide open and all of his biases engaged. That's a huge difference in my book. YMMV. And boy are we along way from tubes vs. SS. Probably good. That subject is deader than Latin.

Tim

And so I gave a scientific approach that would show a measured difference (if any existed between the devices) in the actual behaviour of replaying the major chord and investigating it both the time domain and frequency domain as an envelope/spectral decay down to 1ms (1ms in new science studies is the suggested perception a listener can perceive and interpret audio beats, so 1ms or less would be ideal).
However you feel this will not help, so you do not want a new test, nor listening as any views suggesting there may be a difference cannot be considered at all due to the flawed nature of listening even if we state it is anecdotal and highlights a need to possibly follow-up, do not want to consider those who differ in views to those that you mentioned in support of your view....
Anything else I missed Tim
In that case I agree

BTW Paul Miller has done more with electronics than Sean when it comes to specific measurements and defining how to measure and what to, Sean has massive experience in speakers-room interraction and psychoacoustics-listeners perception and preference.
So again Paul Miller should be weighted near the top of your list

Thanks
Orb

 

[Orb]

The debate comes down to soundstage for me. SS amps in my system don't have the 3d-ness of tube amps. Admittedly, i have not heard a Soulution in my system or some other 40k+ SS. My McIntosh amps are better in this regard---but they have output transformers which SS purists hate. To me, that 3d hologram is closer to the real thing.

I did notice the trend of mega watt SS amps at THE show---I think they are going about it backwards. Higher efficiency speakers are becoming more popular and good, simple circuits will sound better.

KeithR

Keith you experienced differences at all in the perceived reproduction of sibilance/reverb/etc for a hot/poorish recording between a tube and a solid state setup?
Appreciate this is anecdotal but is one area I find tubes seem to be better in general , unless considering the exceptional solid state.

Thanks
Orb

 

[fas42]

I have owned the ASR Emitter II (the big one with three box power supplies and accumulator). At that time it was an excellent value for money in Europe, as there were no distributors and we could get them from Germany at a fraction of the price it was sold in the USA. But it was not my type of sound - in my room and system it sounded forward and immediate, but lacked envelopment. Happily after all the promotion it got from the USA press it was not difficult to find a new owner, who was really happy with it.

A side note. As mentioned here many times, and to pull a stereotype out of the hat, there are 2 typical types of systems: musical ones and "accurate" ones. This is/was an example of an "truthful" one which shows great potential: systems which are easy to listen to in the first place are going to require more work to bring up to scratch. If I had a setup sounding like micro's old one I would be rubbing my hands together in glee because I know that it will be a beauty once the kinks are ironed out.

In other words, a system sounding as micro described is an excellent signpost that you're very close to getting impressive, realistic sound. "Sounded forward and immediate" means that the dynamics, absolutely crucial, for example, for getting realistic guitar sound are there, but what remains the problem is low level distortion, the giveaway being the phrase "lacked envelopment", meaning the system lacks the "harmonic envelope", tonality, is not musical, all the usual phrases. This is when one has to get really aggressive with tweaking, you're dealing with a Formula 1 car that's just been bolted together for the first time, and it's a nightmare on the track. "Impossible", says the test driver. Does it mean the car's a dud? No, it means the mechanics have now to get really stuck into it and make all the fine adjustments, so that all the systems within are in a very fine, correct balance. So, after a week or so of frantic fiddling, that car goes from being a disaster to the best performing vehicle on the circuit.

It's all about having that type of attitude to sorting audio system sound out ...

Frank

 

[fas42]

Regardless of Frank's mileage, it's not going to happen, and it has almost nothing to do with analog/digital/tube/solid state. At one end you have a guitar and a microphone, at the other you have a speaker and a pair of ears. They are radically different in the way they receive, respond, radiate...give me awhile, I'll come up with a couple more Rs.

Aha! The penny's dropped! We need to go back to an idea that Yamaha had many years ago of making a piano shaped speaker driver, so that you get more correct reproduction of that instrument (I think that was the idea ...). So what we need is a room full of drivers shaped like all the different instruments, and a very clever bit of electronics that switches the audio signal between the different speakers at the right split second. The problem's solved, gentlemen ...!!!

Frank

 

[fas42]

I didn't really mean to refer to the Pioneer as the "discovery," but rather the "discovery" that there is small difference between well-spec'd amps operating within their limits

And that's the nub of the problem. Most amplifier "limits" are way, way down, are nowhere good enough to push the speaker to the dynamic levels which gives you realistic sound. Hence why most say it's impossible to achieve that quality of reproduction.

But people will say, "What nonsense! I have graphs galore proving that the the amplifier can hit 200W or whatever". Yeeah, just like many cars 60 years ago could reach 100mph, just to prove they could. So would you travel in one of those old bangers at that speed all day long? No, but you would have no difficulty doing that with a modern vehicle because all the important sub-systems are properly engineered and finely balanced so there's no drama with doing such.

So, just because a component has been given just, just enough ingredients to hit a particular benchmark means very little in day to day living with the animal. It's whether it's actually comfortable doing the "speed" -- translation: driving at high levels of power without injecting unpleasant low level distortion-- all day long that counts ...

Frank

 

[microstrip]

We'll have to agree to disagree on that one Orb. The kinds of scientists Dr. Geddes was referring to were guys like Floyd Toole, scientists who research, design and test audio equipment for a living, not chemists turned critics. On all things audio? I'll go with guys Geddes, in spite of his strong and rather eccentric opinions, Toole, Sean Olive, Sigfried Linkwitz etc. every time. YMMV.

Tim

Tim,

Although I understand what you mean, I find bizarre that you mix people who have very different opinions and views about audio under a common banner that you just call "the scientists" and say you "go" with them . Did you read the Toole book, the many papers and articles of Linkwitz and Sean Olive? Are you aware of the positions of Toole concerning preference, listening pleasure, the duplication of the real experience and near field listening? Or the opinions of Linkwitz about room acoustics? How do you conciliate their views when they scientifically disagree? (a common thing between scientists.)

BTW, reading your posts we could think that the world of audio has half a dozen (or less) scientists and hundreds of amateurs (including some chemists ... )

 

[microstrip]

I had the earlier ASR model in sometime in late '90s or early 2000 and reviewed it. In my system, it was nice and inoffensive compared to other ss of the day but lacked balls, and did sound rather soft and dark. Just my 2cents

The new versions were much improved, but yes, even the recent ones could sound like that with many sources. The only CD player that could make it sing was the hyper clear Nagra CDC or the lively ARC CD7, that could bring some tube aliveness to the system ...

 

[MylesBAstor]

Aha! The penny's dropped! We need to go back to an idea that Yamaha had many years ago of making a piano shaped speaker driver, so that you get more correct reproduction of that instrument (I think that was the idea ...). So what we need is a room full of drivers shaped like all the different instruments, and a very clever bit of electronics that switches the audio signal between the different speakers at the right split second. The problem's solved, gentlemen ...!!!

Frank

Better yet, every driver can be shaped like a test instrument

 

[vinylphilemag]

Better yet, every driver can be shaped like a test instrument

Zing!

 

[Gregadd]

(including some chemists

or alchemists.

Better yet, every driver can be shaped like a test instrument

or an ear?

 

[stargate]

what harry uses

To put an end to this madness-HP use McIntosh MC 2301 tube amps been using them for over a year now in his main room--now he has the Lars-the saga continues--amen

 

[Phelonious Ponk]

Although I understand what you mean, I find bizarre that you mix people who have very different opinions and views about audio under a common banner that you just call "the scientists" and say you "go" with them .

It's not that hard to figure out Orb. I "go with," ie, "listen to" the guys who apply some kind of methodology to their madness. I don't always agree with them, but I respect and explore their positions because they are based on something more than preference. Now with that said, I have no problem with preference either. Can't have. Transducers aren't accurate so I have formed my own preferences, just like everybody else. And I don't own any transducers that behave anything like Linkwitz speakers, (or Geddes) but I sure respect what he's trying to do and how he's going about doing it. What I don't respect, to get back to what got me into this thread, is people declaring their preferences as if they are objectively superior, and aggressively attacking the opinions of others. Personally, I think the world would be a better place if we all did our best to keep everything between the transducers as neutral as possible. I even prefer speakers reasonably neutral, because rooms aren't and I don't want to live in an anechoic chamber, just a nice, quiet, naturally-balanced room with a bit of warmth and gain.

But if someone would rather blow tubes into horns in a glass room, I'm good with that. Just don't try to tell me it is better, because I'm liable to point out that you're, well...wrong. objectively speaking.

BTW, reading your posts we could think that the world of audio has half a dozen (or less) scientists and hundreds of amateurs

No, it's just that the amateurs, myself included, are doing all the talking.

Tim

 

[microstrip]

Yes, we all have different ear/brain interfaces and imaginations or if you prefer creative reconstruction capabilities. Thats why some people can hear a fuse directions have audible impacts that are significant and others can not. And, we must be careful comparing just solid-state to tubes, there are some signficant catergory breakdowns between the two as far as ouput topologies and therefore interactions with the loads (speakers). But, Carver proved with expert listeniers that a particulare solid ste amp could be made to sound like a particualr tube amp. The proof was over a long time ago, the war will go on and on me feels.

Tom

Tom,
The Carver challenge was carried out twenty five of years ago and IMHO its results can not be extrapolated for current electronics. The euphonic distortions of the tube PremierFour dominated its sound (I have not owned it, but I remember well its successor, the MV100) and Bob Carver, an electronic genius, managed to reproduce them in his SS amplifier, individually tuning it. As he never explained how he did it and the experiment was undocumented and could not be repeated it is now just part of the audio history, still adding ammunition to audio wars.

IMHO, this would not be possible with modern tube designs having much better measured and more aaccurate sound performance.

 

[Gregadd]

Yes, we all have different ear/brain interfaces and imaginations or if you prefer creative reconstruction capabilities. Thats why some people can hear a fuse directions have audible impacts that are significant and others can not. And, we must be careful comparing just solid-state to tubes, there are some signficant catergory breakdowns between the two as far as ouput topologies and therefore interactions with the loads (speakers). But, Carver proved with expert listeniers that a particulare solid ste amp could be made to sound like a particualr tube amp. The proof was over a long time ago, the war will go on and on me feels.

Tom

Did he really prove the null hypothesis?
And you can record vinyl to digital and make a perfect copy.
Yeah I heard the Carver T-mod.
Why is Carver making tube amps? Just make another T-mod.

 

[Gregadd]

The null hypothesis is different form the null test.

Here what JA had to say;
Quote:
Where is that original modified Carver amp today?

Bob Carver took it back with him when the Challenge was over, where it was used as the prototype for the M1.0t amplifier that was released in 1986. Stereophile reviewed this model in April 1987 (review not yet posted in our archives) and found that it neither measured nor sounded like the C-J tube amp of which it was supposed to be a clone. The null I measured between the production M1.0t and the tube amp using the same methodology as Bob Carver was just 36dB and then only in the midrange.

John Atkinson
Editor, Stereophile

 

[Gregadd]

Sorry, I am only commenting on one particular instance germain to this thread topic. I think Dave Hafler was the null dude. Carever makes tube amps because he likes the way they sound...said so in the audio critic magazine as well....and I bet because there is a market for tube amps, thats why he made his first tube amp, they sell for huge prices nowadays...silver transformer windings, all the audiophile thingies that could be thought of at the time, etc.

Tom

The "proof" was essentially a sighted listening test by JA and LA at Stereophile. Null test was involved. That hardly counts as proof around here. Smile
http://www.stereophile.com/content/carver-challenge

 

[Ron Party]

Let's assume for the purpose of discussion that my hearing is different than your's (to state nothing of the fact that neither my nor your hearing is a constant at all times).

How then am I to know that what you hear is that which I will hear?

And given that uncertainty, how can I be sure that your conclusion that a particular SS or tube amp is more *real* (substitute your own adjective if you deem it necessary) is factual and not simply a matter of opinion?

The corollary question also must be posed: how can I be sure that your conclusion that a particular SS and tube amp are indistinguishable is factual and not simply a matter of opinion?

 

[Gregadd]

Yeah, I know, but not hearing a difference at all, not one teeny eeny itty bitty bit. Nice to read the article again, thanks Greg.

Tom

I'm gonna hold you to that Tom.

 

[Gregadd]

Let's assume for the purpose of discussion that my hearing is different than your's (to state nothing of the fact that neither my nor your hearing is a constant at all times).

How then am I to know that what you hear is that which I will hear?

And given that uncertainty, how can I be sure that your conclusion that a particular SS or tube amp is more *real* (substitute your own adjective if you deem it necessary) is factual and not simply a matter of opinion?

The corollary question also must be posed: how can I be sure that your conclusion that a particular SS and tube amp are indistinguishable is factual and not simply a matter of opinion?

Ron you hit the nail on the head.

I think in the past many have relegated ss to a sub-category(myself included). The question is that era over? I think it is.

 

[fas42]

To throw a bit more into the fire, why Bob Carver believes tubes are "nicer", from a recent interview:

What happens in a vacuum-tube amplifier, the amplifier makes another sound that is related to the sound it heard. In other words, the amplifier is able to listen to the room. Because it’s hearing reverberation, echoes, time delays, all of the components associated with the venue. The loudspeaker speaks, and the room speaks back to the loudspeaker. The amplifier hears it, via the signal going back around the feedback loop, and out it comes again. It’s not delayed by much; the real decay is the acoustic delay. That delay makes it sound spacious and big to our ear-brain system. We love sounds that have ambience, and echoes, and stuff like that.

The output impedance of a solid-state amplifier is so low that when it tells the speaker to move, the speaker sends the wave out, it bounces off the walls, comes back, and the solid-state speaker will not allow the speaker to move in response to the sound wave coming back and hitting it. The amplifier shorts the speaker out so that the speaker can’t move on the back wave. The amplifier is said to have a very low output impedance. It shorts the speaker out, basically.

A higher output impedance is one of the things we hear when we listen to vacuum-tube amplifiers. It’s one of the things that makes a vacuum-tube amplifier sound so enjoyable and so nice and so spacious.

So there you are, it's all very simple really ...

Frank