Stereophile's Jim Austin disagrees w Atkinson; says tubes have something that can't be measured

[Newman]

To which Jim Austin (JA2) responds:

I just want to make it clear that the opinion expressed by JA1 here, though very well-supported, is not universally shared.

Uh oh…imminent sighted listening fantasy warning, red light alert…

It's true--no one connected with reality can deny it--that certain features in old-school tube amps cause departures from neutrality, especially with loudspeakers with impedance curves that drop below, let us say, 4 ohms, which is most modern loudspeakers.

“Certain features”? Is the term “low damping factor” going to cause Stereophile reader brains to explode? And notice how keen he is to call it a feature? As if he would choke on calling a limitation a limitation, a bug a bug.

No one can deny it because they are measurable at clearly audible levels. But there's another school of thought--embraced by certain other Stereophile writers--that believes that something less tangible is retained in some such amplifiers that is lost in demonstrably more accurate ones.

Some comments in this thread want to argue that Austin is referring to pleasant sounding distortion here, and not magic. I disagree. Distortion is perfectly tangible. Nobody calls it intangible.

It’s clear to me that Austin is referring to things that are not included in routine measurements. Good old magic sauce.

Such opinions are based on subjective experience--self-perceived connection with the music. This makes them literally irrefutable-- they cannot be tested objectively, so they cannot be contradicted, which is annoying--yet (and this is my opinion, as the magazine's editor), in a magazine committed to subjective experience--to listening--above all else, such opinions must not be dismissed out of hand.

I HEREBY DISMISS THEM OUT OF HAND…on behalf of all rational humans who understand that Austin’s views are driven by his renowned denial of the Sighted Listening Effect and his ‘out of hand’ dismissal of the need for controlled subjective listening conditions.

It is Austin, in fact, who is “dismissing out of hand” something that is “literally irrefutable”, namely, the fake sonic impressions that are born of sighted listening.

The irony of what he is writing is galling. The blatant hypocrisy. The very anti-science of it.

Edit: I thought I should add that the opinions/beliefs I'm referring to are held by many of the most experienced, devoted, passionate audiophiles. I do not take that lightly.

Jim Austin, Editor
Stereophile

Just because a bazillion flies eat sh**, doesn’t mean I have to take sh** seriously as a dinner suggestion.

Let me reveal Austin’s immaculate hypocrisy with a simple question: why does he not append every sighted listening review on his madazine with his warning, “ I just want to make it clear that the opinion expressed by (reviewer) here, though very well-supported, is not universally shared”?

 

[computer-audiophile]

... Similar tech could be easily imagined for domestic replay - perhaps with knobs for cool to warm, small hall to big, uptilt to downtilt, tube to transistor etc. Could be good.

Maybe young people will reinvent the tone control on amplifiers.

 

[mhardy6647]

Translation: Magic is real, folks. Santa is real. The Easter Bunny is real. Your feelings dictate reality. Science is for jerks.

The absence of the Tooth Fairy from the above-referenced post is salient. I am not sayin' there's a conspiracy or nothin' -- I am just sayin'.

 

[mhardy6647]

The tubes would have to have some function, if the amp works without or with broken tubes the game would be up

I suppose those 300Bs would make decent input buffers at unity gain. They would give the amp a humungous input impedance.

There are reported (reputed) to be some cheap 'tube' components that may make use of the tubes' heaters (only) as resistors in circuit. This relatively benign use of the tubes (as passive rather than active components) would 1) light the heaters and 2) require that the tubes were installed for the component to operate.

I report, you decide.

 

[theREALdotnet]

There are reported (reputed) to be some cheap 'tube' components that may make use of the tubes' heaters (only) as resistors in circuit. This relatively benign use of the tubes (as passive rather than active components) would 1) light the heaters and 2) require that the tubes were installed for the component to operate.

Haha, seriously though, tubes in small signal applications can be very linear and low noise. If you ran a decent triode at low anode voltage and with DC heating it would be just as good as anything else out there, except for the added cost, heat and required space.

My first oscilloscope was all tubes. It was a fine instrument.

 

[computer-audiophile]

Haha, seriously though, tubes in small signal applications can be very linear and low noise. If you ran a decent triode at low anode voltage and with DC heating it would be just as good as anything else out there, except for the added cost, heat and required space.

My first oscilloscope was all tubes. It was a fine instrument.

I also have to smile when I think about it. When I started my career, there was no transistorized scientific laboratory equipment at all, e.g. at the Physics Institute of the University of Heidelberg. I can still remember the warmth and the smell of hot dust that the racks gave off. Even the computers still had tubes. The sixties were the transition to transistor technology, and we designed our early devices with them.

 

[Somafunk]

Somebody should create an amplifier that has two 300B tubes beautifully presented on top of the amplifier chassis and connected to a dedicated circuit that would make them glow.

Perhaps include a red led for warmth and a blue led for clinical listening

 

[theREALdotnet]

make use of the tubes' heaters (only) as resistors in circuit

This reminds me, BTW, that we sometimes used little light bulbs as PTC resistors, tube heaters would likely work just as well. All ordinary resistors are PTC, or course, you just make them big enough so they don’t get hot.

 

[theREALdotnet]

Haha, when I started my career, there was no transistorized scientific laboratory equipment at all, e.g. at the Physics Institute of the University of Heidelberg. I can still remember the warmth and the smell of hot dust that the racks gave off. Even the computers still had tubes. The sixties were the transition to transistor technology, and we designed our early devices with them.

And let’s not forget, transistors were basically sh!t well into the ’70s. Low noise transistors at the time were an expensive luxury.

 

[SSS]

Haha, when I started my career, there was no transistorized scientific laboratory equipment at all, e.g. at the Physics Institute of the University of Heidelberg. I can still remember the warmth and the smell of hot dust that the racks gave off. Even the computers still had tubes. The sixties were the transition to transistor technology, and we designed our early devices with them.

Indeed true. Used myself ocilloscopes with tubes long time ago. Also restored microphone preamps with tubes of the 1950ies. With low signals the sound is superb and with low distortion. Tube preamps have also the benefit of high frequency amplification which can if desired go up to almost 100 MHz depending on the circuit of course. Early transistors were not able to do this. In contrary power amplifiers distort much more than a good designed transistor amp. Even actual new tube amp products show higher distortion. Guitarists like this for their own sound. Bass players prefer hi-power transistor amps. Although Ampeg tube based power amplifiers are still produced.

 

[theREALdotnet]

Perhaps include a red led for warmth and a blue led for clinical listening

I wonder where that leaves the blue and green spectrum of McIntosh amplifiers…

 

[pma]

The tubes would have to have some function, if the amp works without or with broken tubes the game would be up

I suppose those 300Bs would make decent input buffers at unity gain. They would give the amp a humungous input impedance.

This is what you get if you add a tube input stage to the SS power amplifier which has respectable parameters alone.

More noise and distortion, same power. Maybe some audio poet could write an essay on the "new sound", however the difference is inaudible in the level matched A/B test.

 

[computer-audiophile]

And let’s not forget, transistors were basically sh!t well into the ’70s. Low noise transistors at the time were an expensive luxury.

I can see you know your stuff! (Not only concerning music)

 

[theREALdotnet]

More noise and distortion, same power. Maybe some audio poet could write an essay on the "new sound", however the difference is inaudible in the level matched A/B test.

Well, power doesn’t enter into it. I still doubt that the designers of said tube input stage knew what they were doing.

 

[theREALdotnet]

I can see you know your stuff! (Not only concerning music)

Nope. I come here to listen and learn.

 

[theREALdotnet]

This thread is a perfect example of Social Media Cancer spread. Oh the drama!

I guess that’s what we’re trying to diffuse with nostalgic banter

 

[Spocko]

I've not read all the replies so hopefully not redundant in this one.

It was the question of did a tube amp pass thru something accurate SS amps couldn't pass or was tube sound a coloration that caused me to do series amplifier testing. You connect an amp to a power resistor or synthetic speaker load, tap that with a couple resistors to reduced level to unity gain, and feed it to another amp powering your speakers.

If something about accurate SS amps failed to retrieve information from your source signal you'd expect a tube amp as the DUT to sound like wire as the following SS amp would fail to portray all information. If instead tube amps were a coloration, you would expect the following SS amp to accurately portray that and sound like the tube amp. Cutting to the end, tube amps are a coloration. They don't dig out information in the source signal, they add to it. It may be a coloration that is preferred, but there is no unknown, unmeasurable quality involved. Reversing positions an accurate SS amp feeding a tube amp is undistinguishable versus a piece of interconnect.

Jim Austin needs to do this instead of spreading rubbish information to keep uncontrolled listening supreme over measurements. Listening by itself in such a test would show him he is mistaken.

And Jim's response taken from the OP is this:

• "Such opinions are based on subjective experience--self-perceived connection with the music. This makes them literally irrefutable-- they cannot be tested objectively, so they cannot be contradicted, which is annoying--yet ... in a magazine committed to subjective experience--to listening--above all else, such opinions must not be dismissed out of hand." [my emphasis added]

He clearly refuses to be objective because subjectivity is "irrefutable" thus mutually exclusive of objectivity and ultimately, Stereophile is "a magazine committed to subjective experience". This response alone is very telling - rather than calling anything in Stereophile a "review" which implies some level of objectivity, every single hardware article is nothing more than an opinion piece, a personal endorsement based on individual listening preferences and all that it entails (hearing loss, personal frequency curves, etc.).

Edit: I should also add, that this is so sad because John Atkinson's measurements at the end ironically (insidiously?) blesses the preceding subjective testimonial with a halo of objectivity.

 

[theREALdotnet]

He clearly refuses to be objective because subjectivity is "irrefutable" thus mutually exclusive of objectivity and ultimately, Stereophile is "a magazine committed to subjective experience".

Could that be why Stereophile is never mentioned in AES publications or IEEE Proceedings?

At the supermarket checkout one day I spotted a magazine headline about Harry and Meghan getting a divorce. However, my curious mind was steeled and well prepared from past experiences with audiophile magazines, so I’m going to wait for some objective measurement on that one…

 

[thecheapseats]

...I can still remember the warmth and the smell of hot dust that the racks gave off...

+5000 for "hot dust"...

 

[AdamG]

I guess that’s what we’re trying to diffuse with nostalgic banter

You have fast fingers. As soon as I hit post I changed my mind and deleted the post. But you caught me .

We have to decide as a group what we want this site to be. A Engineering and Scientific community or another form of Social Media where we get dramatic and make fun of others? This thread is just but one example of how the Social Media cancer spreads. As a Moderator I mostly observe and let you folks decide what you want to talk about. When I see this kind of activity in a subject like this I would be damned if I do and damned if I don’t close the thread as off topic.

It’s entirely up to you all to decide. Keep posting here and the thread lives on. Stop and the thread dies. The #1 biggest complaint is too many threads not about Engineering, Science and technical stuff. Just venting a little here.