Is anything better than Aleph 3?

HI Celo,
I think what you should do is go to your audiophile store and listen to a range of amps (that are aleady warm) of your price. If you know someone that you can borrow an Aleph, bring it to the store and compare.
Yes, class A amp gets warm and su... more energy but the sound is very nice. I had had a Kinergetics kba75 (75w in class A) and it was a very good amp but again gets warm. Did have not long ago a Simaudio Celeste 4070 amp with rca and xlr inputs (I had it for 6 years as a reference amp). Cool amp, not power hungry, and very musical and detail amp. Good in every aspect of music (bass, mids,high). More the preamp was of high quality, better it sounded, but even a bottlehead foreplay was a big surprise and a good match... But the Classe DR25 classe A amp was the best in term of 3D sound and with fantastic mids...but was hot.
Now, concerning the Golden Tube se40. It is right that it can have reliability issues but not if you use the good tubes. It is also right that it was not the best in bass and highs but pretty goog in mids. I own one and did mod it 3 months ago with Loc Vu kit from Yahoo Golden Tube group. This is not a small mod but a huge one that is worth the price (less than 200$ when I ordered it).It is now a totally different beast. Bass have more attack than my ss amp right now (a 2600$ amp) and mids and highs are even better. No more distortion as described earlier by someone else. Plus, I hear clearly details that I could not hear before. Feel like in a live concert everytime. I am impressed by this modded amp. Tubes amp and tube preamp are now what I listen to. Personnal taste. But again, it gets warm and it is more power hungry than a class a/ab amp. Also, you can't let tubes amp at on all time...

Since I live in Quebec, I use my ss amp during hot weather in summer, and use my Golden Tube and also my ASL ki22 Fox DT integrated amp (very very good with efficient speaker) during fall and winter since they are warming my living room and plays music in the same time..............
Good luck,
Oh yes, if your hifi store has used amp for sell, ask for a listening session with those. Or look here on Audiogon or elsewhere for used amp of quality for a cheap price. This is the way I bought my ss amp and tubes amp for low price.

I preferred the Aleph J to the Alephs, mostly in what appeared to be better bass performance. They are all good though and I think the J is a real "bargain" these days, though it doesn't have the cool cuboid shape of the original, which some love and some hated. Another good think about the J is that is has a very high input impedance making it much easier to drive with a tube preamp than the Pass Aleph series.

I think Aleph 3 (also 1,2,4,and 5) can sound boring driving speakers with low (6 ohm or lowers) impedance. I found it to sound its best with benign 6 ohm or higher imdedance.

I prefer the Aleph 0 mono amps for their ability to drive tough speaker load and far better bass response.

Regarding the Alephs sounding boring - I won't disagree,as in the wrong system, they can sound bad. I had this experience when I brought my Aleph3 to an AtmaSphere dealer. He was playing some high impedance horn speakers, which were a perfect match for the AtmaSphere 30 watter. When we connected my Aleph, I was very upset, because it sounded so bad, I thought he might have done something to it to damage it when I wasn't looking. For a brief moment, options ran through my head- rant and rave and threaten bodily harm? call the police? call a lawyer? In the end, I stayed calm and learned some stuff. Hooking the AtmaSphere up to speakers that the Aleph was well suited to (4ohm ported) turned the tables - now the Atma sounded boring. They don't put out a lotof power, and if your speakers need it, the Aleph3 won't work well. I have heard SETs in only in shows, and understand the vibrance thing. At some point, I want to get a couple and have a shootout in my own system. Someday.

Thanks again for the latest responds. Well, I think we need to correct one thing here. Aleph sounds boring is one thing, Aleph sounds boring with with wrong speakers/system is another. I do not believe there is one amp/speaker/CD player, etc. that sounds good with everything. That is not possible, IMO. I still would not call it boring, I would just say "not a good match". I know I know, I always protect my Aleph somehow :)