For anyone who moved from tubes to solid state — a question

hilde45 OP783 posts09-02-2020 4:32am@oldhvymec

I don’t use valve power amp below 300, only SS. 300 and above is Valve

Not sure I understand. You don’t use valves/tubes *below* 300 wpc? Only *above* 300 wpc is valves/tubes? I would have thought it was the opposite.
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300 HZ and below I use Solid State, and an active 3 way crossover, with summation. Above 300 hz I use the monitor section ONLY in my speakers, and the onboard modded passive XO. I haven’t used the bass section in my speakers, for 25 years. By design my speakers split at 280-300 hz , to biamp.

It is very seldom I use a valve amp to do bass duty AT ALL. They don’t do it well, so why do it?.

Regards

"They don’t do it well, so why do it?."

Somebody is referring to generalities...  

I’ve owned and heard a lot of SS over the years, some of them really well regarded amps in great systems. Once I re-tubed my stock Dynaco ST-70, my listening experience changed for the better. It was more than just better clarity...somehow the music was more intimate, and I felt like it brought me closer to the performance in the recording studio. 20 years later, adding the VTA mods to the Dyna and upgrading the tubes took the amp to the next level...clearer yet, closer, more info, and even the bass had plenty of whack now. It’s that listening experience that good tube amps do so well, and is what seems to be missing with the many SS amps I’ve heard....tonal balance and clarity were fine, but were more lifeless. With my SS amps, it seemed like I always needed to turn the volume up to get that audio buzz, and my listening sessions were shorter because my ears hurt. With my current tube setup, I’m happy every single time I turn on the system regardless of where the volume is set, and I’m happier listening to a wider range of music than I used to be.....no idea whether that’s due to age or satisfaction with the system, but it took me a long time to enjoy my system this much, and there’s a lot to be said about that.

I can’t imagine giving up tubes at this point, but I do understand that tubes amps in general tend to have a lower damping factor so they can struggle controlling heavy woofers. Depending on the tube amp, some have great bass, so it’s not universal that tube amps have weak bass.....it varies with every situation. I’m getting bass extension to about 30hz with a light kevlar woofer in a t-line....tone and dynamics are excellent, but my listening room is now quite large, so there’s not a ton of low output relative to the cubic volume of the room. An SS amp would likely be better in that range. To help that I’ve added a powered subwoofer with the crossover and gain set quite low, so I barely notice it’s playing most of the time, but it helps augment that lowest octave.

I like to keep an open mind, and maybe some of the new SS technology will mind change my mind someday, but as mapman mentioned, the glow of those tubes is just too cool. :-)

Thanks for the further comments. I have bookshelves and a good sub, but the crossover idea is really appealing. More to learn...