Tube sound: Pre-amp vs. amp?

You do not have to replace both your amp and preamp in order to introduce the sound of tubes. However, if you add a tube preamp, make sure it's output impedance is low enough to drive the input of your solid state amp. You may also need to replace your interconnect with something more revealing if you add a tube preamp. There are many good tube preamps around, my personal favorites are the Audible Illusions Modulus and the Quicksilver line stage. That said, I do not use a tube preamp because my most of my gear has to reside in a piece of furniture and tubes require ventilation. I had a Berning TF-10 that sounded great but was slowly cooking itself until I switched to a solid state preamp (Classe) with Quicksilver Mono Tube amplifiers. This gives me a balance of solid state detail and control and tube warmth and bloom. I have also had to experiment with different cables in order to get the overall sound to gel properly. Before changing your current electronics you may want to experiment with some cables (try Harmonic Technology) and see if your can remove some of the edge you hear.

Joe is right about Harmonic Technology. I purchased their Truthlink interconnect ($125.00 used) to take the edge off of poor recordings and it does, though I prefer my Homegrown silver IC's for everything else. Listing the rest of your equipment would help as their may be an obvious cause that someone can identify. Also budget is a must for credible recommendations.

I've tried tube pre/solid state amp, and solid state pre/ tube amp. I found I got a lot more pleasing 'tube sound' with the tube amp. The preamp didn't seem to add enough tube euphony (audible illusions 3a) to be worth the loss in detail (to my adcom 750). Results and taste may vary !

It is always best to make sure your source components are the best that fits your needs/budget (cd player, tuner and turntable/tape deck). The rest of your system, wires-pre and power amps...and speakers will only have what is feed them by the source components to work with. That said, if you are happy with your front end (source) components, I would suggest trying tubes in the pre-amp and seeing if you like that first.