Sure they have a damping incompatibility. And dagostino don't. The speakers these are used on do require good damping. Transformer is part of the amp, you can't dissociate it while listening? Why even bother with these for such speakers. I do not see the need for high powered push pulls. Low powered SETs / push pulls like el84 at 12 watts, or high powered SS.
VAC 452 iQ review in Stereophile
- Thread starter microstrip
- Start date
Sure they have a damping incompatibility. And dagostino don't. The speakers these are used on do require good damping. Transformer is part of the amp, you can't dissociate it while listening? Why even bother with these for such speakers. I do not see the need for high powered push pulls. Low powered SETs / push pulls like el84 at 12 watts, or high powered SS.
Another "exception" is Atmasphere OTL driving Soundlabs, with Atmasphere tubed pre. Don't miss a thing
You mean . . . on cones. I think high power hybrid amps (with tube input stage) can be a very good sonic alternative to high power SS for speakers that need to be driven by transistors.
Even if you are correct about all of this, I still think high power push-pull tubes can be great for non-cone speakers.
Yes possible. There are not many choices. I have only compared Ypsilon aelius to Luxman and preferred Luxman, and also heard the Aelius on soundlabs ultimate and another Vivid G1 that it struggled with. The lamm hybrids were quite good on scintilla, and I haven't heard the aesthetix hybrids.
I am still waiting to hear what Gian hears from CH precision and I have heard it quite a bit in a number of configurations. What struck me last year in Munich was that all the rooms using CH (and there were quite a few) all had a kind of sameness to the sound even though at least the loudspeakers were different. Despite being one of the "new breed" of signatureless electronics it seems to have in fact a signature and not one that I find consonant with what I hear from live music. YMMV...
It suggests to me inadequate output iron and/or driver stage in the amp...when these are appropriate then the sound of a tube amp is not muddy at all and has plenty of umph and drive.
Me too and I have owned some nice hybrids. I prefer them to pure tube PP amps for the most part. Only SET, SEP or OTL are preferable to me in terms of the realism factor. The NAT Symbiosis SE that I had was a really special amp...only the 2 hour + wamup time ultimately pushed me to sell it (a truly unique design as it was both single ended and a hybrid...but not like KR where the input driver is SS and output is tube. The NAT was tube input/driver and a single big MOSFET output...radical).
I had some sweet Silvweld OTL reference monos that sounded AMAZING on a pair of Acoustat 1+1 (could have been the end of the road system) except they were constantly drifting in bias badly and the heat they generated was equally amazing.
But here you and Kedar classically are talking past each other. Such amps may have enough oomph and drive for you; Kedar is saying they don't have enough oomph and drive for him.
I have heard a couple of panels Brad recommends with SETs. I think he is biased to valves against SS as those clearly showed lack of drive, lack of extension, compression, hardness on the SETs.
Hi Ron,
But these again are subjective - everyone imagines a different version of realism regardless of what they claim they want. Even my local music teachers who teach my kids and hear real instruments all day long, marching band and professional band leaders, all like different gear... guy listening to a top box speaker with Spectral or a top box speaker with an underpowered tube amp may have the same objectives, but why should it matter to anyone?
The best we can do is discuss those experiences
"But Oh, how bitter a thing it is to look into happiness through another man’s eyes." Shakespeare, As You Like It
We just have different Venn diagrams. Proper driving of a particular speaker has to trump ideology.
I would not drive panels with typical SETs.
I still haven't heard a massive toe stubbing SS amp that wasn't either somewhat radioactive or metallic in the imaging, or tamped into blandness as compensation. Maybe they exist, I just haven't heard them.
I do remember hearing Halcro monsters years ago with Wilson Maxx second generation speakers at an audio dealer in Berkeley, and the sound really sucked. It shocked me it was so bad.
The lower powered SS amps utilizing single ended or single pairs PP class A can sound quite good. I have a couple of those (a la First Watt), and VFETs are in their own esteemed category. I surmise SS suffers more from multiplication of devices than tubes.
Interleaving signal level tubes and quality SS can work well.
I do remember hearing Halcro monsters years ago with Wilson Maxx second generation speakers at an audio dealer in Berkeley, and the sound really sucked. It shocked me it was so bad.
The lower powered SS amps utilizing single ended or single pairs PP class A can sound quite good. I have a couple of those (a la First Watt), and VFETs are in their own esteemed category. I surmise SS suffers more from multiplication of devices than tubes.
Interleaving signal level tubes and quality SS can work well.
my local friend and tone arm designer, who happens to be assistant dean of the music school at the university and a professor of music composition, a classical composer, and musician, uses darTZeel solid state amplifier and preamp. it replaced tubes, and his comments to me are that it's just more real. closer to what he hears with live music. a better tool to use for his needs.
it's fair to say if he was listening just for pleasure and maybe had different speakers he might choose tubes. and one could say that about me too. i walk the line of liking tubes but finding truth in solid state.
which proves nothing, but shows that there are lots of completely valid perspectives out there. so we are left to find our own path to musical truth and pleasure.
it's fair to say if he was listening just for pleasure and maybe had different speakers he might choose tubes. and one could say that about me too. i walk the line of liking tubes but finding truth in solid state.
which proves nothing, but shows that there are lots of completely valid perspectives out there. so we are left to find our own path to musical truth and pleasure.
Last edited:
Imagine Caesar if we didn't all hear differently, or value different things from our playback. We'd all be buying Soulution preamps to go into our tube power amps Lol.
it's all about matching amps to speakers. plenty of people try and use underpowered amps on speakers and then figure it out at some point. the problem is the metric used is the "i can turn the volume up to X even" or "volume at Y% on the control is really loud" which is 100% fallacy.
i'd also add that underpowered tubes may sound "musical" but really people are just hearing more 2nd harmonic distortion at higher wattage levels. totally wrong.
effortless sound is the goal. the swell of a crescendo, not a volume control setting at the peak. it's the shove that Fremer said was missing on the big Vacs.
i'd also add that underpowered tubes may sound "musical" but really people are just hearing more 2nd harmonic distortion at higher wattage levels. totally wrong.
effortless sound is the goal. the swell of a crescendo, not a volume control setting at the peak. it's the shove that Fremer said was missing on the big Vacs.
Actually, based on Caesar's quoted text from Fremer's write up, I disagree with your interpretation of that text.
What he is saying is what I hear with AR or VTL. There is not enough nuance or inflection, which happens due to the micro dynamic contrast that Fremer mentions. I don't think he is searching for something negative to write, he usually gets out some negative in an article unless he is fully impressed, and if he is impressed, in follow up articles he mentions the product favorably. The negative that Caesar has quoted is, imo, quite significant. Though on Wilsons I am not surprised at all. The start and stop laziness that Fremer mentions is what I would call lack of flow or continuity. So his criteria here is quite the opposite of hifi. He also goes on to mention this is the "first tube amp I have heard in decades that leaves me satisfied on all genres"... is lukewarm for tube amps. Again, I am not surprised.
Mike, some of us love taking their cars to track meets, full throttle pedal to the metal, able to execute a handbrake turn and order a cocktail at the same time.
And some of us just love to cruise on those B Roads, occasionally pushing it on A Roads. And get to the pub in one piece.
Disclaimer...all pre Covid etiquette.
It's all hugely enjoyable driving.
Similar threads
