tubes and analog


I just "upgraded" from a Mac SS integrated to a Prima luna dialogue 2 tube amp. The reason that I changed amps was that i assumed that the tube amp would be a better match for my Zu Druid speakers. The amp change was a big improvment for listening through my CDP....but not so when listening to my Rega P9. I had to switch to my spare SS phono stage (Graham slee) to get it to sound right. I was using a tube phono (AES) with my Mac. In Short, my tube amp with SS phono stage is not really an upgrade from my Mac with Tube phono stage. My question is.....should i consider a further upgrade to a better tube phono pre or is it simply that a change from SS to Tube amp is more "pronounced" in digital playback?
csmithbarc
Well, the amp didn't exactly "blow up", but because of the wrong fuses it did take out a speaker(woofer) and I doubt Spencer wanted to continue using it until he tracked down the problem. I thought Spencer's explanation revealed clearly why Raul thought what he did and is understandable. The good thing is that this is not representative of Atma's - because someone had installed the wrong fuses - and explains why Ralph and others didn't believe it. I'm assuming nobody except Spencer knew the real story and from all outward appearances it looked like the Atma's had done something terribly wrong. Thankfully, a properly fused Atma should never exhibit this behavior and I think any rational person would admit that installing the wrong fuses in an amp is likely going to lead to problems that are not inherent to the design and could lead one to think there is something wrong with the amp. So shouldn't this be chalked up as a misunderstanding? It seems to me that Ralphs amps were not at fault and Raul witnessed something that appeared like it was. I imagine they both now understand what happened.
Yes, Mab33 and Carlbecker, I think you guys have summed it up nicely. Never in my wildest dreams did I expect a used pair of well-cared for amps, carefully packed, sold to me w/extra driver tubes, etc. would come to me loaded with the wrong valued fuses.
Docsavage, I think you are being a bit harsh on Raul, as he drew a reasonable conclusion from what he witnessed. If Ralph hadn't later mentioned to me the idea of confirming fuse value, I might not have caught it for a while.
I apologize to the original poster for contributing to driving this thread further off track! Cheers,
Spencer
I agree that Raul's integrity should not be held in question based on this misinterpretation or misunderstanding or whatever it was.
Raul is as honest as a person can get. This doesn't necessarily mean that he always speaks using rosy words. He just described what he saw from his own perspective, as we have witnessed blown tubes in the middle of a presentation more than once. As Sbank said, one can't draw conclusions about a component's reliability if the design is not in its original form (fuses in this case).

Regards