Tube Amp w/Solid State Pre-Amp ?????

59: you'll have to be extremely careful what amp you use with the spectral. the wide bandwidth of the spectral gear is a difficult load for tube driver circuits. depending on the amp, you could have components actually fail in that circuit. of course this is just my opinion, but i think it would be somewhat of a waste of the high speed of the spectral by matching it with a tube amp. of course it depends on your specific taste and what speakers you would be using. hope this helps. tim

Conventional wisdoms state that if you use solid state and tubes together that the preamp should be tube and the amp solid state. In my second system I use an Audio Research VT100 amp(tube) with a Macintosh preamp(ss) with electrostats(also a difficult load to drive)with excellent results. I still get the benefit of the tube sound and the speed and accuracy of solid state.It works in my system,but as always, you will have to try it in your system to see if it works for you.Good luck

Just remember Spectral preamps are designed and recommended to be mated with Spectral amps.

This seems a bad match to me. The tube amp you'd need to drive the B&W's is going to have to be an absolute brute. I once heard a C-J CAV-50(50W using EL34) with the N805's. Guess what? The tube amp was woefully inadequate. Couple that with the Spectral preamp, and I think you will be very unhappy. If you do insist on a tube amp, you'll need one of the monsters(VTL, VAC, Manley) with a LOT of tubes(8 or 16 per side). When it's time to retube, the money will be on the order of many new amps. And they are not the best sounding tube amps to many tubeophiles. I use tubes almost exclusively. But if you're married to the combination you have now, I have to recommend solid state(YBA, Jeff Rowland, Classe, or maybe even Mark Levinson). Blasphemy? No, I realize tubes are not for all circumstances and it's better to steer someone in what I feel is the right direction, rather than to create another person who complains about tubes. Gotta have tubes? Trade in the preamp towards an all tube rig. I realize you love the Spectral, but you may want to at least try an audtion.

If you're sticking with the Spectral, try an Ayre V-1 or V-3 amp. Although SS, you should get the warmth you're looking for.

I would do it the other way around with a tube pre-amp and a solid state amp. You could use an outboard solid state phono if you had a low output cartridge. This would give you the warmpth with all the controll and punch of solid state. I use a Cary SLP 94 with a Sim 4250 and out board creek phono. This is the sound you may be looking for.