SET Shootout China VS The USA

@mozartfan 

I'd say more specifically give credit to the Japanese audiophile/music lover community for reviving the interest and admiration for SET/low power tube amplifiers driving horns-high efficiency speakers. They bought a ton of discarded and ignored old Western Electric old movie theater audio equipment. 

 

Once transistor power became common in the 1960s (More power than tubes for far less money). Tube components were viewed as archaic and useless. It was Jean Hiraga who brought the low power SET/High efficiency speakers movement from Japan to Western society in the 1970s.

The rest as they say is history. Dennis Had (Founder of Cary Audio) was an early American SET manufacturer. Don Garber (Fi Audio) was another early American convert who built SET amplifiers. 

Charles 

I’m glad I stocked up on 307A’s when they were relatively inexpensive. It was inevitable that they were going to be ’discovered’’ at some time. When used correctly they sound particularly fine into special edition Magnequest FS-030’s using the 4 ohm tap. The bottom end is quite authoritative for a SET.

Once transistor power became common in the 1960s (More power than tubes for far less money). Tube components were viewed as archaic and useless. It was Jean Hiraga who brought the low power SET/High efficiency speakers movement from Japan to Western society in the 1970s. The rest as they say is history. Dennis Had (Founder of Cary Audio) was an early American SET manufacturer. Don Garber (Fi Audio) was another early American convert who built SET amplifiers.

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Hey Charles Thanks for this facinating history of how SETs became part of this hobby. Now I know why the ~~Legendary~~~~ Coral Beta 8 speaker had its birth place in Japan. WE , ESPECIALLY ME of all FR fans in the world,,,, owe our fine high fidelity speakers to this savant in Japan who developed the CB8, Yes I know the original genius was in Berlin, Chicago 1920;s, then we owe alot to Jensen and EV others,, But it is the CB8 where the technology found a new voice in purity, fidelity. I realize the davidLouis VX8, VX6 are direct heirs to this masterful speaker. The Yaqin MS2A3 DHT PP is NOT, NOT new, its been around for perhaps a decade,, as per some comments i see on the Inet. A real hidden gem among a massive pile of KT PP amplifiers. I am not holding my breath on a massive movement away from KT series amplifiers into SET/DHTPP amplifiers , not anytime soon. Most folks are leary about FR speakers, not to mention they can be ,,no in fact are very pricey, Single drivers $5K-$10K a pair, and w cabinets,,, one needs to be close to a millionaire to afford a pair. I remember the days back in early 2000’s the SETs were mentioned ona topic here, speaker shootout, Back then the SETs were pricey, and few offered. Now with chinese tech, machine made, we can all now have access to these highly musical amplifiers. KT series amplifiers hold on interest for me any longer.

 

There are nuances in the DHT tubes which are missing in the voice of the KT series tubes, 34,88,120, 150, 170. Its just not there,,,nice,,but as they say, no cigar. Folks can argue all they want,, **design, trans quality, etc etc** fact of this matter,~~ truth~~ of this shootout,

is the DHT have some magic that KT series are not privy to.

 

If its not there, ITS NOT THERE,,

why lie about it, why pretend otherwise???

The End of The Story

Lights out.

bottom end is quite authoritative for a SET. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ In the KU307 YT video,, I was wondering if Ken had a ~~~sub woofer~~~ attached to the amplifier,, that deep and powerful. One super DHT tube for sure, Lucky you. Now in a shootout with the highly regarded 45 tube..., 2 super high fidelity tubes in a shootout,,, neither wins,,,correction,,,neither loses, they both win,,,, even draw,,lol

charles1dad,

A nice concise history of what happened.  I would add that another aspect to the story.  When stereo came around, the need to find room for two speakers, instead of just one, meant that smaller speakers gained in popularity.  These smaller speakers, particularly of the air suspension (sealed box) variety were inefficient and required higher powered amps and this favored solid state over tubes.

Mozartfan,

There are many pentode/tetrode tube amps running pushpull that are extremely musical and great sounding with horn systems, fullrange driver systems, and multiway systems utilizing fullrange drivers.  You cannot generalize from hearing only something like the Defy 7 and certainly not by "listening" to YouTube videos.  I have heard terrific 6L6 and KT66 amps and some of my favorites are 350B and 349 amps (the favorite of the amps I own runs the 349 tube).  I also own a pushpull 45 amp (triode tube) and a pair of Audio Note Kageki (parallel 2a3 SET).  All of these amps sound good.  My all time favorite amp is an output transformerless amp that is a custom built amp, and a pushpull Western Electric 59A amp (252 tube) which is something I could never own as a pair is well into six figures.  Even with tubes that I don't particularly like (KT88, KT120, KT150), there are examples of amps that run them that I found to be decent.  I know that there is a strong desire to come to conclusions about various aspects of design or parts choice, but, it really is not that simple to do.  The more I hear, the LESS I am able to draw definitive conclusions in these areas, although I do see rough tendencies.  As to such rough generalizations, I do like quite a few speaker designs that use fullrange drivers in multiway systems (e.g., Cube Audio Nenuphar Basis), a small handful of true single driver systems (Charney Audio, Voxativ), but mostly, I like horn-based systems.