Vintage vs. New Tube Amps

There is surprisingly little being said. Most of the vintage amps are now 40 years old and really need a total overhaul if you are intending to use it full time. They also relied mainly on EL 84 output tubes. Unless your a serious collector then you enter another domain 6l6s, 300b, and vintage EL 34 amps are lengendary and very costly. There are so many good modern production relatively inexpensive tube amps with few of the reliability problems that its really a no brainer. I happened to have both. The modern amp will cost you something a really good one will cost you a lot. I use a Consonance M 100 plus for a modern EL34 40wpc intgrated which has a remote. The sound of a vintage EL 84 amp is quite distinctively sweet and pretty but I wouldn't use one for daily consumption. Consonance is but one name you can find around the distributor is the Audiogon dealer Quest for Sound, (good guy) He carries a less expensive competitor Sound quest which is his personal brand. Other house brands are Prima luna which I have not heard personally out in California, TAD another Audiogon constant etc.These are all Chinese and mostly point to point wired they cost about 3 times what a relatively raw mass production old Scott cost.

The scott is a very musical piece and offers an excellent built in phono and headphone. But the newer Conradjohnson amps sound better but require an additional phono and headphone seperates

hi,

I have both a new Cary SLI-80 and a rebuilt EICO hf-81.

if you are favoring the vintage route then you are best off getting a rebuilt amp. There are a number of vendors that specialize in selling rebuilt old amps or rebuilding onw that you own.

see here

http://www.nosvalves.com/sale.htm

http://www.hotglassaudio.com/home.htm

Being a vintage collector, vintage amps( RCV, etc) are certainly worth it. Tuners/Receivers are particularly great in vint gear. Just get someone knowledgable to either restore , update or mod it. No brainer considering the cost of new. Then you can consider a refurbished vint "NEW"! Good luck- I love those tone controls!!

you didn't mention your budget. the dynaco ST-70 is good - in the mids especially - and is easily worked on if necessary. you can find them just about any day of the week, frequently for cheap. you can then get a more modern tube pre (like an early Audible Illusions) for a few hundred, getting yourself a nice tube pre/power for under a grand

you can find integrateds (Scott, Fisher) for a lot less than that but if you don't know a friendly and cheap tech who can work on these things, they might end up costing you a ton in repairs. that being said, the old integrateds can sound great - and you even get to play with "filters" and bass/treble controls (so un-audiophile!)