Tube Amp for Martin Logan Speakers


Hi, I love tube sound through my Martin Logan Aerius-i fronts and Cinema-i center. I currently have a Butler 5150 which is a hybrid, but it busted on me and would cost $700 to fix. I've had china stereo tube amps that were pretty good and gave true tube sound, but not enough drive for higher volumes. I live in condo, so not like I can blast music anyways but still. I got the Butler because I wanted 5 channel tube sound for home theatre (The piercing sound from my Denon 3801 receiver was not pleasant to my ears). It appears there are only three multi-channel tube amps around, from Mcintosh, Butler 5150, and Dared DV-6C. The latter two are hybrids, and the last one was one of the worst tube amps i've ever heard. I have no clue why 6Moons gave the Dared a 2010 award, but maybe it's because it produces only 65W.

So since multichannel tube amps are hard to come by, and they tend to be hybrid, I was thinking maybe it would be best to get three true tube monoblocks to power my fronts. Thing is I wonder if they will be underpowered for my speakers, and not sure which ones are decent for the price. Maybe China made ones would suffice, and they still go for pretty expensive price. I'm wondering if anybody knows of a decent powerful tube monoblock that is affordable, because I can't pay $3000 per block. or maybe best to just repair my Butler. Thing is, I'm not confident that it is reliable. The tubes are soldered in which is weird, and i've taken it to a couple repair guys who both said that the design is not good, because it's very tight inside and more susceptible to being fried from DC voltage areas. it's too sensitive.

Any suggestions for tube monoblocks, even if china made ones? the holy grail for me would be Mcintosh tube amp, but they are hard to come by. Thanks.

smurfmand70
Thanks for the Stereophile URL link Unsound. My tongue-in-cheek quip was dead-on: the MLs should be driven by a hydroelectric plant - actually 2; one for the ESL panels and the other for the woofer. :)

^The sensitivity while low, isn't terribly challenging, at least for the earlier model.
I used to build many SS Class A amps some water cooled back in the 80's 90's they were along the same lines as the ML ML2's but stereo and not such a "bomb or hydroelectric plant" as you guys put it. But they could almost double as well all the way to 2ohm.

I had a led light on the front that used to flash on transients at I think it was 32v (for my Quad 57 owners) this saved my customers from arcing the panels.

90% of my customers were Quad 57 owners, they had never heard their Quads sound so good.
None went back to tubes or SS that couldn't drive the Quad's with a constant near linear voltage across the audio band. Which means for those, an amp that can "almost" double it's wattage for each halving of load impeadnce from 8ohm down to 1ohm

PS Exactly doubling wattage for each halving of impedance is impossible, the ML2's stretch the truth a little with those specs above, but they come close.

Cheers George