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I'm going back to tubes... a question for y'all

It's been years and years, but I remember the sound my old Stromburg Carlson used to put out. Also grandmas old Packard Bell. My vintage Marantz had 'the sound' also.

For some reason I just can't get it (that sound) out of my head, and here was the kicker: A week ago a buddy brought over a forty+ year old Harmon Kardon mono reciever for me to offload on e-bay. I plugged it in with it hooked up to one of the speakers, let it warm up, found a station and THERE was That Sound! I didn't say anything... my buddy looked at me and said "that sounds better than your (other stuff). The sad thing is... I was thinking the exact same thing.

Oh, the question... how many of you chased through SS stuff only to wind up back at tubes (sometimes many) years later.

I ordered up an amp from Paul at 2B audio. I'll let you know how it goes...
128x128rwbadley
the_smokester
174 posts
 
Rwbadley,
I'm with you. After college I lost track of my great tube system and had modest solid state systems for many years. Also discovered "perfect sound forever" and lost interest in listening for lack of time and money.

In the last couple of years I have acquired another system...this time it's pretty high end with tubes and vinyl all over the place. I spent a lot of time auditioning systems and my experience--clearly not as exhaustive as many on this site--is that tube amps are just more musical (at least at the price I can afford).

My system is well-behaved. Sure, I have to mess with biases and replace tubes occasionally but nothing catastrophic.

Best wishes,
s23chang
619 posts
 
Yes... Not only I switched to tube gear.. I'm even going back to vintage gear. If you find the right one that matches your speakers, they actually better than most of the modern tube gear.
rwbadley's avatar
rwbadley OP
143 posts
 
I'm going to give the hot rod ta-30 a try. I initially was reluctant to go for the Chinese made unit. But then I figured that Paul put his stamp on it with the mods, and it felt like I was in fact supporting our local business. All indications were this modded amp was a great way to dip back into tubes, and that it had the werewithal to keep up with some of the higher end equipment.

That, and I know who to call if there's a problem!
reubent
6,940 posts
 
RW,

Good call! Paul is the man! BTW, I just got my mod'd unit on Thursday and it is very good after only about 5 hours of burn-in. Can't wait to reach the 30 hour mark as Paul suggested. Man, this thing sounds BIG and WIDE. It fills my room like no other amp I've ever had in my system.

I think you are in for a treat!

BTW, where Y'all from?

Enjoy,

TIC
rwbadley's avatar
rwbadley OP
143 posts
 
Wife, Son and I live in Reno,Nevada.
I was initially concerned the wattage output of the ta-30 being a fairly low 30 watts may not be enough to drive the Dynaudio 52s. I am using an extremely nice (powered)sub to fill in the bottom end.

The most recent amp I've been auditioning has 80watts into 8 and 160 into 4 ohms. It is indeed powerful, detailed and clean, but lacks character at the lower listening levels I would just assume be listening at.

It will be interesting to see how this tube unit compares.

What other amps have you tried in your system? and in what respects did the ta-30 kick their butts out the door?

RW
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