@redox44 I had a Tektron that had heater voltages for 45, 50, 2A3, and 300B and I loved it. Sold it to a friend who loves it a lot. Great amps.
jerry
Best Tube Amp for High Sensitivity Speakers: 45, PX25, or 300B?
I am looking to change / upgrade my tube amp. I have a good, all-purpose Primaluna EVO 400. It employs the EL34's and has a nice sound, especially in the ultralinear mode. Other components: streaming from Innuos Zenith MKIII to Lampizator Atlantic DAC. Everything playing through Daedalus floorstanding speakers with a 96-97dB sensitivity. Currently, my office / listening room is on the small side: 12'L x 16'W x 8' H, but I'm building a new listening room on our farm where I will later upgrade some components to fit a larger room. Now, here are the tube amp options I am looking at:
Audion Silver Night PX25 8 Watts. Very popular among some, touting a slightly more balanced, dynamic sound over the 300B.
Swissonor 45 SE or Tektron TK One 2A3 / 45 i The 45 is the low wattage (2.5W) but sweet tone alternative. Considered by many to be one of the most musical out there. Of course, its low power makes it more restrictive, only efficient with high-sensitivity speakers and in more small-to-moderately-sized rooms. It might be great in my current office but would have to work harder in a larger one later.
300B Integrated Amp, Make / Model not yet determined. 8-10 watts. Of course, the 300B is making a big comeback and has wonderful characteristics, especially in the midrange and especially with certain genres of music such as acoustic, vocals, jazz, etc. I heard one opinion from someone with a history of work in sound production, "The 300B is great if you just want to listen to a female vocalist with a guitar." One take on it.
Adherents of the PX25 and 45 tend to regard the 300B as a nice-but-limited cousin. I honestly have no experience with any of these three tubes. I moved from SS to tube with the PrimaLuna, a well-built amp that I have increasingly felt carries some limitations that other tubes--more focused specifically on higher sensitivity speakers--would open up the sound in the lower frequencies and some tone qualities all around.
Any opinions would be welcome.
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A friend with very sensitive (99db) wide baffle speakers with Beyma AMT tweeters has a Coincident Dragon mono block amps which sound amazing. You might take a look at their site: https://www.coincidentspeaker.com/mpsip_amps.html |
Look up Radu Tarta one of the best tube designers in all North America specializing is SET 300 B amplifiers using Lundahl transformers and chokes as well as many custom super high quality parts ,built to last a lifetime and a Huge cut above his prices are actually less then name brands with far superior build quality .he has built me both Amplifiers and preamps , beung in a multi state audio get together ,you can get as custom as you want Power coated front and top plate with even pinstriping. If you want That from front panel express , not cheap but built to whstever you want and uses the finest Khozmo volume attenuator and input digital read out A+ quality roughly $5k on up and Tubes as much as you want to spend , Western Electric 300b ,Taks from Japan KR , as I mentioned before your budget dictates the options ,A Giant step up think Bentley Quality for decent name brand priced ,not China !! |
I can confirm what auditroy mentioned. I have a LM-805ia with all different tubes, 93db efficient Tannoy Turnberrys and a couple REL S/510’s. Good times. I am interested to listen to an Atma-Sphere and the 300B from Decware. I’m told those are supposed to be the next level up in amps from where I’m at in my journey. I hope that whatever you end up with, you have an opportunity to listen to it in your own listening space first. |
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