Where are you today?

I started with tubes, went SS briefly, went back to tubes and never looked back. The economy has had nothing to do with it.

I came to realize that to achieve the goal of making the music sound real, the equipment had to be designed to obey the rules of human hearing rather than a set of arbitrary bench rules, which often have nothing to do with human hearing at all. You can't do that with transistors (not to say that that might change in the future...).

Solid state to tubes back to solid state back to tubes back to solid state back to tubes back to solid state and now back to tubes. All in the past year. Who said this wasn't a fun hobby?

I sold all of my ss gear this year. My reference system uses a tubed integrated (Cary SLI 50) and sealed box speakers (Triad System 3). I purchased the Cary in 1996 and it replaced a Pioneer surround receiver in my tv room. It transformed a system that sounded mediocre at best to something that is fantastic just by substituting that one component. Early on, I made some attempts to improve the sound with cables and power conditioners but all the changes resulted in degraded performance. So it has become my reference due to the fact that it sounds fantastic and I have changed only the tv and the cabinet in the last 12 years. I always judge changes in the big system by their comparison to the reference. Did the change make sense musically?

The big system is all tubed by VAC. I love my preamp and I switch between the two VAC amps, the PA100/100 has a more intimate or classic tube sound and the PHI 110 is more neutral with more bass extension. I just purchased new sealed box speakers for this system (ESP Bodhran's) since I decided that type of bass is one of the things I really liked about the reference system.

The economy hasn't kept me from spending money. I just purchased the speakers (ouch) and ordered two more tube traps from ASC. I'm not sure what I would look at buying next.

I went from solid state seperates to solid state integrated to a tube integrated which is where I am now. I found that the tube integrated had a musicality that none of my prior SS amps exhibited.
Although I find that it takes the right tubes to make a tube amp sing. Not any old tube will do. A SS amp could still be a possibility in the future, but right now I'm enjoying tubes too much to care.

My last SS stuff was Threshold SA Amps combined with my SP10II, and some Quad 63's. Started with tube amps in '91. Have had multiple amps and speakers pass thru the house since then and haven't really been totally satisfied until nine months ago when I acquired some new Silverlines.

Now with a modest tube amp (which I use either as a basic amp or an integrated), the old SP10, and some tubed and SS sources, I think I'm settled. How can I tell? Easy, I'm not fanticizing about what something advertised for sale would sound like if I had it in my system. I've let my magazine subscriptions expire (the glossies are no longer interesting except for the Pass ad with the striking violinist - almost worth the cost of the subscription!), and I can't really think of how to improve the sound.

Maybe I should get a new room/house now so I can start all over. :-)