Chinese tube amps

[Peter Leyenaar]

I don't find it a hunt for a diamond in the rough, I have looked at a number of Chinese amp and experienced 2 up close.
What I have seen so far is of excellent quality and design .
Congrats with your Muzishare 7 , I am sure you will enjoy the amp.
https://www.china-hifi-audio.com/en...p-1425?zenid=2ca03f69c33f2129c07ad854747f8e6e

 

[PappyBlue]

I have the Muzishare X5. Built quality is very impressive. And it sounds great.

Built in the same factory as Line Magnetic. The Muzishare user manual uses the exact same illustrations as the Line Magnetic, but it is chinese only. Maybe Muzishare is built for the chinese market only.

 

[GTsmokeya84]

Yea I believe it was meant for the Chinese market. That being said it was super hard to find any info on it and I just said screw it I wanted more power than the Yaquin. The X7 is really nice like I cant believe the value it brings to the table. I am not a super critical audio guy but I know what I like and it sounds damn good to me.

 

[Frank Dernie]

https://www.china-hifi-audio.com/en...-p-923?zenid=4a41b23b5110c891983565d8350ca4b3

I have a Classic No16.0 push pull valve amp. A friend who is a valve amp repair specialist as a hobby had a look over it and improved the insulation of live wire on the input and tested it, he said it was pretty much as good as this type of amp gets, so the output transformers must be good.
I have used it with BBC LS5as and some 109dB/watt horns but mainly just look at it - it is nice looking and on my record cabinet whilst a Job INTegrated drives the speakers...

 

[Miiksuli]

I also picked Muzishare X7. Very nice sounding amplifier. It's not perfect because the stock tubes are mediocre. If you want best performance you need to get better pre and end tubes. I recommend RFT ECC82/83 and TAD STR-KT88 Blackplate. Also biasing needs to be done. If you have strong KT88 tubes you can get 25% more output power, biasing it higher than 40mA. It would be very nice if @amirm could do a review of this amp.

 

[peanuts]

In general, tube amplifiers have too little harmonic distortion to color the sound in the way people think.

anyone with experience in tube amps would laugh at this. every tube amp i have owned have had distinct tube sound.

 

[DVDdoug]

anyone with experience in tube amps would laugh at this. every tube amp i have owned have had distinct tube sound.

A good (high fidelity) amp of any design doesn't have any particular "sound". It should have low noise, low distortion, and flat frequency response.

Guitar amps are not supposed to be high-fidelity and they will have a particular sound whether they are made with tubes, transistors, MOSFETs, etc. Most guitar players have a favorite/preferred amp and in many cases it's a particular tube amp.

When I was in high school somebody gave me two tube amps. One was a McIntosh and it was mono but it sounded "perfect", just like any good solid state amp. I haven't heard any modern McIntosh amps, but I'd bet they sound perfect. The other one was a no-name stereo amp and it had badly rolled-off highs (and I made a "random experimental" modification to re-boost the highs).

 

[KA7NIQ]

to answer you question concerning Chinese made tube amps; they are excellent , way cheaper and easily
compete with North American built amps.
I just bought an amp today that has a pair of EL 34 tubes, driven by a 12ax7 and dual tap output transformers. It cost all of 141 dollars DELIVERED !

 

[egellings]

To me, the charm of tube amps is their circuit simplicity, which invites home brewing your own from scratch. If you are a little off in your design, the tube amp will likely still work somewhat, whereas with a SS design, that usually means smoke. I can't see buying a tube amp at all, since the charm is in building it and hearing it work.

 

[levimax]

anyone with experience in tube amps would laugh at this. every tube amp i have owned have had distinct tube sound.

I used to think tube amps sounded different and then I tired double blind level matched testing between a tube and SS amp and all the difference disappeared.

 

[Sashoir]

My first amplifier was a chinese-made valve integrated from Silsonic. Purchased in 1993, and still playing in my brother's house.
I also have a pair of icon audio monoblocs which I'm almost certain were substantially made in china. I think these date from around 2001. The contact on the power switch of one of them is buggered, and I have to get it repaired, but until a month or so ago it was also working splendidly. I wouldn't claim that either one is "the last word" in anything, but I've had many years of enjoyment from them.

 

[Miiksuli]

I'm still happy with the Muzishare X7. I have been using it now four months. It does have intermodulation distortion at lower frequencies it's not that bad but too high to make any usable headphone measurements. I did change all stock except rectifier tube. This can be also used with estats headphones but not for really dynamic headphones because you hear that intermodulation noise. It has alot better dynamics than Stax SRM-313. Ultralinear channel balance 0.3 dB and triode 0.1 dB.

REW measurements.

RMAA measurements.

Noise


Dynamic


THD

 

[Miiksuli]

^ It's still a bit noisy but it gets a lot quieter with TAD E82CC. I changed the driver and two splitter tubes to those. Line output can also be used for dynamic headphones if you have Ifi iESL Pro. It can eliminate almost all the noise from tube amp with 96 Ohm setting with 32 ohm dynamic headphones. If you are in a very quiet room then you may spot small hiss coming from the tube amp. X7 HP output is quietest but also more distorted and warm.

 

[dzerig]

anyone have any experience with chinese tube amps? wish i hadnt gotten rid of my pas 3/st 70 all those years ago, but probably will never be able to get back in the tube game.

They're worth what they sell for. Not terrible, not fantastic. You want actual good clean tube sound, you have to pay for it. Not necessarily ampsandsound prices, but it doesn't hurt.