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In Reply to: RE: FWIW, the old tubes vs transistors debate.... posted by villastrangiato on June 29, 2012 at 20:14:32
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Exactly.
With a company like Spectral - that's been making some of the most advanced amplifiers in the world for decades - you'd think by now it would be the holy grail of amplifiers. Clearly, it is an oddity - always has been and probably always will be.
As noted earlier, I've owned amps with 200V/microsecond slew rates and rise times under a microsecond. Along side those, I've owned amps with slewing rates intentionally limited to 25V/microsecond - as with most SS amps. And after many hours of comparison, I could not hear a difference between the two.
Why? Because the loudspeakers we connect these amplifiers to produce harmonic and intermodulation distortion that is orders of magnitude higher than the "hundredths of a percent" comments put forth by folks like those in this thread. The science and the listening confirm over and over and over again that amplifiers aren't the weak link in the audio chain and haven't been for decades - loudspeakers are and to some extent, human hearing is. Most of us can barely hear past 17 or 18khz yet we seem to need bandwidth out to 500 khz from our amps for "accurate reproduction" - RUBBISH!
The preoccupation with TIM and "time smear" that corporations and their sales reps capitalized on many years ago has in the ensuing time been exposed as a fraud - along with various other snake oil schemes in the audio business. Very few people are willing to buy an expensive Spectral amp - as good as they are, because there's no real payoff in sound improvement.
With tube amp manufacturers, the added even ordered harmonics and soft clipping "features" of tubes are still used as "audiophool sweetners" today- literally decades after it was discovered that SS could outperform them in just about every category - most notably with low output impedance and high current delivery.
The Spectral 360 is a great example of a SS amp that "out tubes" most tube amps. On that basis, it should be extremely popular among the audiophool illuminati. But it isn't largely because of marketing, poor profit margin, and the lack of "audio sweetners" present in its performance - and most importantly - it doesn't take several minutes to warm up nor does it glow in the dark very well. In terms of speed, quietness, and strength, the Spectral 360 is arguably one of the most capable amplifiers ever made for home use. But very few people know about it or own it essentially because at that level, the market doesn't know what it wants. Those who have that kind of money to spend typically rely on the advice of pushy snake oil salesmen to whom marketing and profit margin mean everything. Having an amp that can slew at 600V/microsecond is like saying I have a V-12 powered Renault F1 car in my garage. It's not street legal so I can't drive it anywhere but the engine sure sounds nice...
When loudspeakers reach down into the "hundredths of a percent" region in harmonic and intermodulation distortion, I might actually consider listening to the tube fanatic reasoning or claims that some audible difference exists between SS and tube other than that which is readily attributable to tube "issues" like high output impedance or losses associated with output transformers for models that are so equipped. Until then, it will be talk to the hand and keep your insulting, baseless snobbery to yourself. I reserve the right to remain highly doubtful without referring to the tube faithful as wackjobs or audiophools as long as the tube faithful refrain from labeling me ignorant or lacking in sound perception.
With tube amp manufacturers, the added even ordered harmonics and soft clipping "features" of tubes are still used as "audiophool sweetners" today- literally decades after it was discovered that SS could outperform them in just about every category - most notably with low output impedance and high current delivery.
This is quite incorrect. Transistors will make a lot of the same even orders if they are also operated single-ended. What if a tube amplifier is designed to be fully differential and balanced like most transistor amplifiers?? The answer- no even ordered distortions, as they are canceled not just in the load, but at every stage in the amp, just like solid state.
So no 'sweeteners'... yet we get plenty of comments about the improvement that our amps make, even over Spectral but I leave that one up to you.
I think you will find as well that even though you have 'high current delivery' that it does you no good. Its a simple fact that the amplifier may be able to drive lower impedances, but that is not the same as saying it is sounding its best into those loads. You can see it in the specs- distortion is lower driving higher impedances like 8 or even 16 ohms. You hear this as the amp sounding smoother and more detailed- more 'tube like' as many reviewers are prone to comment.
Now if simple sound pressure is your goal, maybe you have a benefit to those low impedance speakers (but you would be better off with horns- there really is no good argument for speakers 4 ohms or less). But if *fidelity* is your goal, think about an easier speaker to drive. There is an instant payoff.
You are like a kid who never got out of the Junior High of hifi. Your lack of sophistication with regard to listening puts you squarely in the "high power rocknroll" camp of "hifi" (I would call it more the loud and don't care what it sounds like crowd).
Read the essay by Nelson Pass, read Cheever, read Boyk and Sussmann and even read the work by Geddes, which has nothing to do with his speakers.
I find it almost comical that you can't realize that its not the amount but the kind and pattern of distortion that, at least in part, makes an amp good or not. You keep saying it measures low enough you can't hear it, but people do...consistently. You are the fool who has closed his mind because of what he "knows". I run into many silly people who think they "know" something because that is how they were trained (programmed?). A GOOD scientist starts with the open mind and the power of observation. Engineers are generally NOT good scientists and will follow "good" engineering practice because that is how they were trained. There are exceptions (Nelson, Ralph and Charles for example) but most are happy to stick to the mantra "If I make it low enough surely its inaudible...right??".
Even IF we were fooling ourselves, don't you find it strange that we consistently fool ourselves in only one direction? Its not like I made a conscious decision to say "Negative feedback and Class AB amps suck". I started with the usual suspects of amps (receivers from big name Japanese companies) and then some pro type amps because they had high power and low THD. But after HEARING better I drifted towards better sound because I wanted realistic sound and not just loud sound.
THat is how I eventually arrived at these criteria. Try them out and borrow or demo amps that meet them and see if they don't sound better. I dare you!!!!!
I have been through all the great measuring, bad sounding amps I ever care to hear so I won't go back there again to the land of sound but no music.
"The preoccupation with TIM and "time smear" that corporations and their sales reps capitalized on many years ago has in the ensuing time been exposed as a fraud"
Oh? Where? I'd just love to read all about it...
Thanks, Rick
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