Tube in Preamp or Power amp?

"The whole world is a Tuxedo and I'm a pair of tube socks" - ME
(some material borrowed from George Gobel)

Gotta say, in this day and age, probably a lot more up side for reasonable cost spending time playing/tuning with a tool like Audyssey than playing with tubes. If only Audyssey had that cool retro looking tube glow! YEah I know, apples and oranges, but times and technology changes. Usually best to ride the latest and greatest wave for most up-side. At least that is how I tend to think. Digital processing, done well and made easy, has huge potential upside in playback much as is already the case with most recordings these days. But only if done well.

The time spent of messing around with tubes is miniscule relative to that spent listening to music, but if you enjoy the sound of tube amps it's an enjoyable and engaging part of the hifi experience. Also, I like the natural sound of recording dynamics in my listening room without somebody else's idea of what it "should" sound like, so I don't get suggestions of "a huge potential upside" of signal processing of low frequencies. It's an artifice for the aurally challanged and is simply somebody trying to sell me something I, and most others, don't need. There will be no digital nanny moving into my house.

I think the below which I found in an amazon review on a tube integrated sold there says it all:

"After going through quite a few solid state and a few tube amps, I can't help but think of the wife mistress analogy.
Solid state amp is like a wife who is faithful, reliable, low maintenance, complex, intelligent, multi tasking but cold in bed.
Tube amp on the other hand is like a mistress who is not very reliable, high maintenance, too much fuss, simple but hot in bed."

SAy no more....

...I'll take the "hybrid". :^)

I use and measure at a totally different way than they use it. I think and work from a highend perspective. This means instruments and voices need to have the right proportion and the right sound. It is a very big accidence that it came to my path. I was surprissed that a brand like Onkyp can give a deep and wide stage. Because all there competitors are 2-dimensional. I tested them in the past for this. I was also surprised that with a Audyssey pro measurement I could get the sound realims of highend pre amps. When I bought a Onkyo receiver in 2010, I just bought it for a second set for fun and surround. In the last 11 year before this I had many highend sets just for stereo. I did many tests with Audyssey. When I measured at there way. The results were ok. So I changed the hights and the places. After some time I reallised that I can get a superior level in sound realims, drive, focus, depth and wide out of it. The acoustic part is only 1/3 of the whole Audyssey system. The other parts give me the freedom to get more dynamics and resolution. What I did at the show ( where I was the absolute sound) was letting people hear the difference between the acoustic part on and off. But also the other systems which give me more dynamics and resolution. Also these I can set on and off. So every person could hear what all the different parts did. I like things to be clear. When I visit clients I can blow every preamp till 10.000 euro away. This is what I do all the time in the last year. We compare clients there old pre amp with mine with Audyssey pro. I never had a tool which was this superior to any other preamp even at high prices. We will make an advertisement and we invite every person with his own pre amp and power amp to compare. Because I love comparison in audio the most. Listening to your music without acoustic limitations sets you free of all the acoustic problems. And it will let you hear more information and with much more precision. But also in the lowest freq. you will hear more different layers. I've spoken with a few brands which I use at shows to give a demo in the US as well. This is the only way that I can show my words are as I wrote them. I will inform every one here at Audiogon when I get this chanche.