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Tube gear section.

Do you want a tube gear section ?


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    73

Spitfire93

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Can we have a dedicated tube gear section ? if it doesn't already exist (could not find it) ?
I think everybody knows that tube gear will never have great results when measured, but some peoples are attracted by it, is like a guilty pleasure.
Thanks.
 

kemmler3D

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While I personally don't care about tubes I think having a section for it isn't a bad idea.

After all, the appeal of tube gear is the fact that it has tubes, not that it is likely to outperform solid-state stuff. That has been true for decades now. Comparing them to other amps is therefore less meaningful, makes sense to keep the content separate.
 

JeremyFife

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Hmmm - voted 'no' before I thought about it - sorry about that. I meant that I'd rather see reviews of solid state electronics and speakers - but that's not the point.
Why not - it's a hobby and tubes are interesting - and certainly worth separating out the threads.
I'd read.
 

mhardy6647

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Well --
1) I can't imagine it would be anathema to have such a section.
2) Probably goes without saying that I'd be OK with it. ;)
3) Not sure "we" need (i.e., ASR needs) such a subforum.

Just me talkin', though, of course!

 

Doodski

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Well --
1) I can't imagine it would be anathema to have such a section.
2) Probably goes without saying that I'd be OK with it. ;)
3) Not sure "we" need (i.e., ASR needs) such a subforum.

Just me talkin', though, of course!

That tube looks like a alcohol burner. :D
 

fpitas

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Can we have a dedicated tube gear section ? if it doesn't already exist (could not find it) ?
I think everybody knows that tube gear will never have great results when measured, but some peoples are attracted by it, is like a guilty pleasure.
Thanks.
Not great maybe, but competently designed tube gear should have more or less inaudible distortion. As Amir's testing has shown, a lot of modern tube gear is "special effects". Or maybe the designers are idiots.
 

kemmler3D

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Not great maybe, but competently designed tube gear should have more or less inaudible distortion. As Amir's testing has shown, a lot of modern tube gear is "special effects". Or maybe the designers are idiots.

I'd guess that one of the biggest segments of Tube buyers is people looking for FX boxes, whether they know it or not. Someone designing tube gear would be sometimes be wise to add enough distortion to please those folks.

To put it another way, a competent designer who is aiming for transparency isn't going to use tubes in the first place. It probably takes a lot of skill to add just the right amount of distortion.
 

fpitas

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I'd guess that one of the biggest segments of Tube buyers is people looking for FX boxes, whether they know it or not. Someone designing tube gear would be sometimes be wise to add enough distortion to please those folks.

To put it another way, a competent designer who is aiming for transparency isn't going to use tubes in the first place. It probably takes a lot of skill to add just the right amount of distortion.
That could be the unsatisfactory position they are in. As for whether they are adding just the right amount of distortion, that is an open question....
 

kemmler3D

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That could be the unsatisfactory position they are in. As for whether they are adding just the right amount of distortion, that is an open question....
Open questions like that are nice for the industry, because the customers have to buy multiple $3K amps to answer it. ;)
 

fpitas

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Open questions like that are nice for the industry, because the customers have to buy multiple $3K amps to answer it. ;)
And $3k is just the beginning. It's amazing how much they get for some of them.
 

MaxBuck

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Having a "tube section" would serve to validate, to some extent, objectively inferior gear. As my understanding of the goal of this site is to identify and celebrate excellence in high fidelity, which frankly is not something that tube gear is capable of, it just seems out of place.

Then again, it's @amirm's site; he should do as he likes.
 

fpitas

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Having a "tube section" would serve to validate, to some extent, objectively inferior gear. As my understanding of the goal of this site is to identify and celebrate excellence in high fidelity, which frankly is not something that tube gear is capable of, it just seems out of place.

Then again, it's @amirm's site; he should do as he likes.
I see your point. But some people want tubes nonetheless, and come here. It would be nice to have some reasonable and objective judgements available.
 

DMill

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DA73F264-FBFE-4DE5-B831-D0708EAB1DDF.jpeg
 

fpitas

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It would be great fun to put some NCore amps under the chassis, and still light up the tubes for show. I bet the golden-eared wonders would be gushing about the tube warmth and depth :D
 

kemmler3D

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Having a "tube section" would serve to validate, to some extent, objectively inferior gear. As my understanding of the goal of this site is to identify and celebrate excellence in high fidelity, which frankly is not something that tube gear is capable of, it just seems out of place.

Then again, it's @amirm's site; he should do as he likes.

"Objectively" inferior implies agreement on the goal of the equipment. Tube fans aren't (the clear-headed ones, anyway) interested in true fidelity, they're interested in euphonic distortion or maybe just cool-looking equipment.

For tube amps to be objectively inferior they would have to be judged on the same basis as solid state amps, but IMO their users don't really judge them that way. Or at least, I hope they don't. They're definitely worse in general at quantitative measures of fidelity, but if their users cared about that above all, well, they probably would not be using tube amps.
 

kemmler3D

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Case in point: you can easily simulate tube amps in a fairly convincing way using various DSP effects (the number of decent tube distortion VST plugins is massive, even for free)... but hardly anyone uses these.

If you really just wanted tube sound you can get it very cheap or free.

Yet, we have a disturbingly robust market for actual tube amps. I think the appeal is the tubes themselves. If it were anything else, cheaper solutions would have completely taken over ages ago.
 

MattHooper

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Not great maybe, but competently designed tube gear should have more or less inaudible distortion.

"Competently designed" IF the goal was inaudible distortion. That's not necessarily, it seems, what some tube amp manufacturers are going for ("if it sounds the same as SS, why bother?")

So "competence" should be judged based on the goal of the designer. (For instance, Nelson Pass is, I believe, known as a competent designer of SS amps and has produced models with inaudible distortion. But he's also known for deliberately designing for slight distortion in some models).
 

egellings

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Since tubes lend themselves to DYI more than S.S. stuff does due to their simple circuits and their tendency to sorta work even if not done exactly right, a DYI-tube area might work. power amps, preamps, crossovers, da woiks.
 
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