Tubes Through Solid State

My experience has been tubed pre into ss amp. Ran this combo for years and liked it very much; kinda the best of both worlds. Equipment wise various cj tubed pre's and cj ss amps. Last combo was a cj premier 16lsII into a cj premier 350. Having said that I now use a Cary SLI-80F1 direct coupled integrated and I am very happy and have not looked back.

CHuck

Is there an analog component to your question? I'm just curious why you asked here.

I've always felt this kind of mix was a temporary fix for another problem.

Each piece of gear in your system contributes to the sound output in a different (but equally important) way. You choose your amp to best match your speakers, or so the theory goes. With most amps, you can be more flexible with regards to preamp choices.

For many years I was running Apogee planar or hybrid ribbon speakers, so I used high-power SS amps and a tube preamp. I enjoyed those systems a lot. Later and with different speakers I paired a CJ tube amp with a CJ SS pre. I also enjoyed that system. For the last year or so I have been using an all-tube SET integrated with horn speakers. And I love this system.

What's the moral of the story? It's all good, and there are no hard and fast rules. If it sounds good to you, it's good.

Dan ed the combination of tubes and ss can be very satisfying so not sure what you mean about a temporary fix. And Br3098 concerning your last comment couldn't agree more.

Chuck

I've almost always have had a mix. Mostly its been a tube pre and a SS amp because powerful tube amps tend to been more costly then there SS counterparts. It gives a nice touch of tube magic with the ability to drive a load well.

My current setup is just the opposite; tube amps, Rogue M180s, (a unbelievably great piece of gear, not particularly flashy but sonically stunning) and a JC2 pre (also unbelievably good!) and the combination is really amazing. It's giving me more tube goodness then any tube pre/SS amp combination that I have had. It also doesn't hurt that my cdp has a tube output stage,something I have never liked until I heard the Ayon.

Having tubes in your system allows for tube rolling which I love to do. It gives you the ability to change/improve your system at what is usually a small cost, not always, compared to a new piece of gear.

What you have to be aware of is the actual (can differ from published spec) output impedance of the preamp especially when it's tube and input impedance of the amp that you are planning to pair together. Tube preamps can have a high output impedance at the frequency extremes or across the board which can cause either the low bass or highend to be rolled off if paired with a amp that have a low input impedance. Usually a manufacture will give a spec at 1k but not tell you that at 20Hz the output impedance is 10x what it is at 1k. The typical rule of thumb is you want the input impedance of the amp to be at least 10x that of the output impedance of the pre but personally I look for a preamp that is less then 250 and an amp that is greater then 30,000.

Chris
Tel Wire