I said I was done in this thread and once again, I lied. I swear this question is in good faith and not meant to challenge or make a point. While looking over at Tungsol's website I saw this;
RM or RK, there has been this overriding premise (by RM) that most of us have more power and overhead in our amps than we really need. What is your response to the premise above (and everything else in the link provided)? I can find the link if you like, but in one of Charley Hansen's last interviews with Stereophile he stated that after thinking throughout most of his engineering career that tube-o-philes' preferences were largely imagined, he had come around to the thinking that it is in fact extremely difficult to engineer a solid state amp that captures the same magic that a tube amp can have (and in the meantime Charley acknowledged that he had come around to believing that there is in fact a certain tube magic) and that he thought his latest amp design had captured that magic. I only bring up Charley's arguably unrelated "epiphany" because it may or may not be related to the premise of Tungsol that most amps are severely overloaded in actual operation. So what do you say about this? I happen to have 150 watts of glorious tube power (actually more) with my ARC 150SE matched to very efficient and easy to drive loudspeakers-DeVore O/93's-and I have no problems with audible hum and I am very happy with how my system sounds.
Engineers and musicians have long debated the question of tube sound versus transistor sound. Conventional methods of frequency response, distortion, and noise measurement have always assumed linear (clean) operation of the test amplifier and have shown that no significant difference exists. In actual operation most amplifiers are often severely overloaded with signal transients. Under this condition there is a major difference in the harmonic distortion of tube and transistor circuits.http://www.tungsol.com/html/faqs14.html
RM or RK, there has been this overriding premise (by RM) that most of us have more power and overhead in our amps than we really need. What is your response to the premise above (and everything else in the link provided)? I can find the link if you like, but in one of Charley Hansen's last interviews with Stereophile he stated that after thinking throughout most of his engineering career that tube-o-philes' preferences were largely imagined, he had come around to the thinking that it is in fact extremely difficult to engineer a solid state amp that captures the same magic that a tube amp can have (and in the meantime Charley acknowledged that he had come around to believing that there is in fact a certain tube magic) and that he thought his latest amp design had captured that magic. I only bring up Charley's arguably unrelated "epiphany" because it may or may not be related to the premise of Tungsol that most amps are severely overloaded in actual operation. So what do you say about this? I happen to have 150 watts of glorious tube power (actually more) with my ARC 150SE matched to very efficient and easy to drive loudspeakers-DeVore O/93's-and I have no problems with audible hum and I am very happy with how my system sounds.