Valve (Tube) Amplifiers

[Superman]

Well, I did it. And now I find one of the most slippery slopes of all. Here is the brief story:

As a kid, I played bass guitar. Several reasonably (locally) successful bands, from early in high school until late college. I had some good experiences with some solid state amplifiers (the Phase Linear 700B was amazing)......but.....without a doubt, there is just something about tube amps. Ampeg was my favorite. The guitar players used mainly Marshall. 'nuff said.

Shortly after college, I was at the home of a friend of my dad's and heard a McIntosh hifi stereo. Oh. My. God. The difference was STUNNING. Breathtaking. I never forgot it. Since that time I have heard other tube amps and although they were not McIntoshes, they delivered the warmth and 'stage' I have always loved from tube amps.

A few months ago, I began thinking about tube amps. And thinking. And reading. And lusting. And trying to step away from those thoughts. They kept coming back. I did the best I could but in the end, I succomed. I found a gently-used, one-owner, good-condition Yaqin MC100B amp. Here is what they look like:




It has four KT88 power tubes, four 6SN7 and two 12AX7's. In triode mode (less power, richer sound), it abolutely destroys the old Hitachi solid state amp I have been using for 25+ years.

For comparison purposes, a good-condition McIntosh will cost anywhere from $3000 for an MC-225 (25 wpc) to more than $5000 for an MC-275. Out of my price range.

But now the bad news: I needed a "phono preamp" because turntable signals are WEAK. My CD player works fine, but the preamp is needed to play records. No problem. I got a recommended one for $60. But.........

I was looking at a used one, nearly 40 years old, for $1300.

The tubes in my amp are Chinese, and they say the unit will sound much better with better tubes. I can prolly replace the four output tubes for something like $200............or I can spend $1000 apiece. APIECE!

Someone help me. Shoot me in the head, before it's too late!

[greglepore]

Awesome. Search "audioshopper" on ebay and check out what Bob Carver is up to these days.

[Steve Viegas]

Tube amps are nice...oh, that probably doesn't help...

[tabs]

Roger Russell's McIntosh History Page

I bought Mac equipment back in 78 and am still runnin it..mine is solid state stuff MC2125 Amp, C27 Preamp and MR 78 Tuner. All of it is worth more today than I paid back in the day. The Mr78 Tuner is especially sought after as being one of the best Tuners ever made and is worth about $1800.00

where ever I go I always keep th eeyes open for Mac equipment...especially the Tubey stuff. Which even though it is over 40 years old is still worth BANK.

[imcarthur]

Looks like a nice amp. A phono preamp does 2 things; It amplifies the low signal from a MM or MC (lower output) cartridge & applies the RIAA curve. We sell a couple under the Cambridge brand which are decent & cheap but you should be able to find something on Audiogon.

Ian

[arcsine]

I have been rebuilding a bunch of tube guitar amps for friends of mine and there is absolutely a difference in tube vs solid state. The best place I have found to find tubes is Welcome to TubeDepot.com!. Quality of the tube is easily discernible even by my ears and it is a hoot to swap them out and see the effect pre, power and even rectifier tubes have.

[nota]

had a few mono mac's
in fact the guy who got me into them said tube pre-amps are old junk
just buy the tube amps forget the pre's [modern stuff is better for pre-amps
he married the daughter of the guy who had the tube tester machines [everywhere]
and sold his old stock to china so maybe the tubes you got were copys of his old stock

btw he also said the transmitter tubes were the big money never thought the common
amp tubes would be that high cost
I wonder if they are better or worse then old stock USA tubes

[kach22i]

Originally Posted by Superman

Yaqin MC100B amp.

Never heard of it, looks very handsome though.

Welcome to the tube club.

Mine at 100 watts using EL34's


Tube preamp below it, with tube phono section.......my Mac CD player below that.

I bought new tubes last year here:
http://thetubestore.com/

[Shaun @ Tru6]

I know a fellow that made this for himself. Sounded brilliant. Hoping to have him make me one some day.

[imcarthur]

Originally Posted by kach22i

An Atlantis Reference Rack. One of our older products - now disco'd . . .

Tubes sound different. In the digital age, they help to soften the digital harshness of the 1st decade of CD. But they also tend to soften the lower midbass - not always but usually - rounder, a little less snap perhaps. I have only owned tubes once - a pair of the original QUAD mono amps. Very underpowered for what I wanted to do with them. I do have a Precision Fidelity preamp somewhere here but I have lost it in my crawlspace.

Ian

[GG Allin]

I've had a McIntosh MC500 (Solid State)



And a Mesa Baron (Tube)



If I could get the McIntosh back for what I sold it for, I'd never let it go again.

[sc_rufctr]

I better stop reading this thread. Whenever I see stuff like this I suffer from GAS. (not the kind you're thinking of )

[sc_rufctr]

Originally Posted by Shaun 84 Targa

I know a fellow that made this for himself. Sounded brilliant. Hoping to have him make me one some day.

This I like. I've seen kits you can build yourself using Russian tubes.

Are the Russian tubes any good?

[Chocaholic]

Yes, it is a very slippery slope. Been there. Audio Research, Sonic Frontiers, Enlightened Audio Labs, Dunlavy, Thiel, VPI, etc. I can't even imagine the margins on this stuff. Prices are so out-of-line with reality....$5000 speaker cables, little $250 wooden rings that sit atop your speakers that "bring out transparency and depth (yeah, right)", carbon fiber cones that your gear sits on, and the list goes on. Oh, yeah....cuz you mentioned it, $7 Russian vacuum tubes packaged in velour-lined little wooden boxes for $1200. A fool and his money. . .

Don't let your imagination regarding sound quality get the best of you...unless you've got plenty of cash to burn. How do you know if it sounds "right" unless you have the live performance to do A/B comparisons....and in the end, is it worth it?

Admit it...it's a gear fetish, more than a sound quality fetish. A musician may prefer tubes to create the sound-style he/she seeks. But we're talking about reproduction here......a different animal. Nothing wrong with it, but having spent countless tens of thousands over the years...I can say I wasted a lot of money and had some cool gear. But all the esoteric nonsense to achieve "transparency, imaging, balance, depth, yada yada yada, is all in your noodle. Just my 2 cents.

Cool looking amp by the way. Don't forget about Audiogon.com also.

[IROC]

Originally Posted by sc_rufctr

Are the Russian tubes any good?

If you look around there are lots of options besides Russian stuff. You'll have to spend some money for nice NOS stuff, but there's a lot out there. The Russian stuff isn't bad, though. Even some of the Chinese tubes are decent.

I'm coming from the guitar amp side of the of the issue, but I've found some really nice Mullard, Visseaux, Mazda, Tung-Sol, Marconi (MWT) tubes out there.

[speeder]

Macintosh tube amps, (and tube amps in general), are one of the sweetest things on this earth. Unfortunately, they are not making them anymore and like anything else coveted by rich baby-boomers, they have been priced out of the stratosphere while simultaneously vanishing in supply.

Other than that, they're still the schit.

[WolfeMacleod]

Although it doesn't have anything to do with tube amps, I had read somewhere about a piece of amp equipment that was considered VERY high end, very expensive.
Someone figured out how to replicate them. Turned out, they could be built for around $100 or so using not too many components.

Anyone know what that was?

FWIW, I know there are tubes that can cost easily over $1000... guitar players are nuts.

[RWebb]

one of the magazines has said that Macintosh has high build quality but sound quality is not very good

might have been Stereophile (?)

comments from people not wedded to Mac??

[imcarthur]

McIntosh is now owned by D & M Holdings who also own Denon, Marantz, Snell, Boston & Escient. They were widely ignored & disparaged by high end dealers throughout the 80s & 90s - never due to their build quality which is universally viewed as excellent.

Ian

[greglepore]

Originally Posted by WolfeMacleod

Although it doesn't have anything to do with tube amps, I had read somewhere about a piece of amp equipment that was considered VERY high end, very expensive.
Someone figured out how to replicate them. Turned out, they could be built for around $100 or so using not too many components.

Anyone know what that was?

FWIW, I know there are tubes that can cost easily over $1000... guitar players are nuts.

Bob Carver famously duplicated the sound of a Mark Levinson amp (multiK at the time-early90's)with a cheapish transistor amp-a/b comparisons bystereophile mag guru's couldn't differentiate.