Describe ube sound vs solid state

Ralph, can a ss amp have such low distortion as to make that comparison not tenable? I suppose a better question would be, have you ever listened to a ss amp without the typical characteristics you ascribe to them? Could you be fooled in an ABX test? Sorry, I really don't mean to take you to task this way but there always seems to be a need to arrive at a defensible position when this topic comes up. It's probably just me but my perspective is borne of observation. I mean the tube guys vs the ss guys. My goal is accurate to life sound. To this end, the fine detail I hear in ss is just not there in the tube amps I've auditioned. Nor is the bottom end drive/slam of a high current ss. Mind you they have been few and far between but always not impressive and very typical sounding. I find a lot more variation among ss amps sound wise.

Atamsphere, It's not just with my speakers and it's not just me, others have noticed the same thing for some time now; please see the my earlier post on this thread dated 03-10-15.

Mapman, Gpgr4blou, Please realize that chart reflects how humans hear/percieve undistorted musical instruments/sound frequencies. One would not hear/perceive those instruments/sound frequencies as the chart portrays if the sound was distorted (for example; deviating from flat frequency response) before one heard it. For the purposes at hand it's merely an academic curiosity, and flat frequency response from our systems is still highly desirable.

you'll hear the frequencies as described be it signalk distortion, whatever. Of course the goal is always to minimize distortion or at least what is perceived as distortion.

If you look at frequency response of some transducers, like certain headphones you can see some are designed to compensate for ear sensitivity at various frequencies at various DBs and some do not. Much like the old style loudness controls on vintage receivers and amps.

What sounds best is solely a matter of preference but in general keep noise and distortion to a minimum and things should sound pretty good personal preferences aside.

^I'm sorry, but I don't understand the first sentence.
Headphones are typically an unnatural way of hearing things. Some headphones use signal processing to try and compensate for this unnaturalness.
Old fashioned loudness controls allow for some compensation of the way the human ear perceives sound at unnatural lower volume levels. Which interestingly enough, is further argument as to how the above mentioned graph only reflects human hearing/perception vis-a-vis an accurate stimuli.