Are Quicksilver power tube amps in the same league as VAC, VTL, BAT, ARC, ...?

RALPH ATMA-sphere and Mike quicksilver are all I own because they are the best in my humble opinion and RALPH AND MIKE ARE truly awesome and patient because I am stupid but I have good ears and both take the time out of their day to help me and teach me…..my goodness the ATMA AND QS I ALTERNATE on my Merlin VSM and bobby is smiling

@shtinkydog 

I have no problem with anyone who likes them, it's just that my experience with them was different. I don't think that the Silver Monos that I owned can be considered as anything close to reference grade, but they are nice, with obvious tube type colorations.

@roxy54 You mean to tell me that you're not gonna slice and dice him up for grammar, punctuation, run-on sentences, capitalization, and shouting?  🤣

@shtinkydog 

The whole post was so hopeless that it was beyond critique, so I had mercy. I did wonder if he had ever heard of commas though.

It’s a two year old thread, and it was a reasonable question to ask. I’ve enjoyed the vibe and passion of the replies, capital letters and all, members sharing what they like and why. It’s one of the reasons I come to this forum. Its all good.

When I started down the path of buying and trying different tube amplifiers, I overlooked Quicksilver for years and their made 45m away from me. My local audio dealer (in business 53+ years) has been selling Quicksilver and AudioNote as long as anyone in business. What’s amazing is Mike Sanders is still in business, with a loyal following. The value of what he offers far exceeds the entry price.

I wanted to try the new Mono 120s when they came out with the massive quality transformers, and option to run KT150s or KT120s, all the bones where there. In stock form, at the entry price. They were solid. Can they be improved?, sure.

Experiment -

I decided to see what would happen by installing higher end silver-gold Mundorf coupling capacitors, Nichicon Power Capacitors, along with vintage NOS mallard input/driver tubes, and trying some others from new production pavane small tubes to see what can be achieved. While these amps were "too expensive to manufacture" and this along with a few other models have been discontinued, oh what a bargain find+. Just like the early Triodes, and current Mid Monos, the little EL84 integrated, real bargains and value.

Yes - I’ve compared these against amps at 2-3x the price, and the results are great - super happy that I tried this. Nothing has replaced my amps since. Nothing comes close for the investment that can run these tubes [properly], in their operating window. Best of Luck with yours. :)