Is there a 300B type amp out there with some WATTS behind it?


I recently acquired a Feliks Audio Arioso 300B amp.  To put it simply, it is incredible.  I understand one way to tackle the issue of using SET amps is with high sensitivity speakers.  Is there a 300B or something that gives you that same sound out there with power so you have more speaker options?

audiovicker

Canary Audio Grand Reference 300 B mono amps. 120wpc. a few used on the market

No doubt a very good sounding amplifier (I believe "8" 300bs per side). Problem with choosing a push-pull 300b amplifier is that buying multiple sets of these tubes gets expensive pretty quickly. Particularly so if you are purchasing the upper tier 300b tubes.

It is an excellent tube in my opinion, but they are not cheap to buy. Fortunately, the better-quality versions generally have long lifespans. for more SET power I’d consider the larger transmission type tubes as mentioned previously.

Charles

How did everyone miss the Western Electric 91E integrated? A single ended class A making 20 watts pc into 8 ohms. Expensive, but there ya go...

Here are two possible options. This is a good 300b push pull amp that puts out 22 watts (Audio Space Reference 3.1 300b Integrated Amplifier on US Audio Mart):

 

And this 300b SET amp is supposed to be more robust than some others:

https://www.coincidentspeaker.com/mpsip_amps.html

Frankenstein 300b mono amps

Amps build around a higher powered 300B-XLS tube, or the 520B (which is another higher powered 300B type tube) will get you around 24Watts or so. My amp which is Art Audio Jota 300B SET is an example of that design. It worked spectacularly well with speakers such as Tannoy Definition (89db) and now Fyne Audio F703 (94db) while providing the SET magical pure class A amplification.

 I understand one way to tackle the issue of using SET amps is with high sensitivity speakers.  Is there a 300B or something that gives you that same sound out there with power so you have more speaker options?

@audiovicker You have put your finger on the classic issue with tube power. Its expensive and difficult to get right. If you look back to the 1950s before the transistor, you'll see that high efficiency speakers like Altec, JBL, Klipsch and EV were common.

If you really want to hear what your amp is about, in most rooms speakers with efficiency north of 100dB is what you need. My speakers are 98dB but running a 300b amplifier on them will not show off what the 300b does. You really do need that kind of efficiency! This is because if you really want to know what the amp does, it should never be asked to make more than about 20-25% of its rated power! Otherwise distortion colors its presentation too much.

If that's not an option you'll need more power. That likely means a push pull amplifier, since 8 Watts or so is really the upper power limit of SETs where they can be considered 'hifi' in terms of bandwidth. SET's single biggest Achilles Heel is bandwidth and power- above 8 Watts bandwidth suffers so much that if you have a speaker that is truly full range, you'll notice that there's a problem!