20 Vintage Amps That Prove They Really Don’t Make Them Like They Used To

@quincy This is an interesting article and worth reading. 

But the premise of the article is false. There are plenty of amps out there that are built 'like they used to' in that they are built with high quality parts and construction (including point to point wiring), meant to last as well as sound good. 

That page is the biggest dealer in fluff, disinformation, and general weirdness that I've come across. I delete their posts when they show up in my FB feed.

I have a Futterman Harvard Music H3a. Mine is a bit different than the photo here. Just a pair of HB5 pentodes connected to an Altec autoformer per channel. This was a special order to drive a low impedance speaker system. I bought it from the original owner who used it in the 60’s.

The Futterman OTL is NOT a circlotron! It is a totem - pole arrangement with one half of the output stage as a cathode follower and the other half having unity gain. Julius used 60db of feedback to reduce distortion and lower output impedance to make his circuit work with 8 ohm speakers.

@atmasphere + 1

The design of many of these amps is timeless & in many ways as good as almost anything today. The parts quality on the other hand is all over the place w/ some good & some not great that can be really improved w/ better parts which many people have done.

The Conrad Johnson Premier Four which I owned in 1985 was probably the best 3 dimensional imaging amp I’ve ever heard & beautiful mid range & tone if not slightly  rolled off in the extreme frequencies. The Dyna Stereo 70 I grew up w/ was overall similar sound just much less power. Both are true classics!