Old tube versus new tube gear

Hi Mapman,

With respect to Brook specifically, my answer to your question has to be somewhat speculative, because as I indicated I have no experience with their highly valued separate power amplifiers, and my experience was only with one mono integrated amplifier.

But extrapolating from that experience and experience with a number of other highly regarded vintage pieces, most notably several of the Marantz tube models, I would say that most top shelf pieces from that era, when in excellent condition and/or well restored, would be competitive with recent models **that are at similar price points** (asterisks added for emphasis).

Concerning speaker selection, most of my experience with vintage electronics has been with modern speakers, and I don't think the factors that are involved are particularly different than when matching modern tube amplifiers with modern speakers. 2A3s and 300Bs can't provide a great deal of power, even in push-pull configuration, which obviously rules out a lot of speakers. On the other hand, the Brook amplifiers provide 2, 4, 8, and 16 ohm output taps, so they are fairly versatile in terms of impedance compatibility.

Best regards,
-- Al

Thank you Al,
Modern speaker designs are up to par and some perhaps much more so,
I would certainly imagine.
My idea of the pairing with vintage speakers of the day was purely nostalgic.

Look into the Cayin/VAS line of tubes. These are all new, great sound, great value. Most of the units designs are knockoff's of the classic legacy tube units of Marantz and McIntosh. You get great old designs done in state of the art parts. I have the a Citation pre-amp, amps (2 pairs of monoblocks), integrates (2). You will not be disappointed.

More or less, every current production tube amplifier is a knockoff of one of the three classic designs.

Sonically, I find some of the differences in new and old are related to:
1) A lot of the older designs used a lot more circuitry
2) As people had less money back then, many older amps are biased colder to prolong tube life
3) Older designs used carbon resistors and paper in oil coupling capacitors to produce their richer sound. Modern amps generally employ metal film resistors and polypropylene coupling caps, and sound more forward and insightful