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Question about wpc on tube amps

I have been kind of looking at tube amps based on what people seem to think about them.

Here is my question- whenever I look at the wpc, they are remarkably low vs. a solid state amp for the money. 

It leaves me scratching my head. Then, somewhere I read that you can't compare a tube amp with a solid state amp . Something along the lines of "10 watts of tube power equals 100 watts in a SS amp". 

What? Is this real?  Seems unlikely to me. 

Are the wildly low power ratings on the tube amps I am looking at simply due to the fact I am looking at $1,000 amps vs the bajillion dollar amps you guys buy?

Would I be better off spending the money on a tube preamp for the "tube" sound I always hear about. 

I am running Magnepan . 7's  with a Bryston amp. Since the . 7's are power hogs are tubes even a realistic thing for me in my lowish budget? 

Thanks! 

 

timintexas

Showing 1 response by byang12

byang12's avatar
byang12
39 posts
 

@timintexas

WPC is just an rough/partial measurement of capability to drive speakers by an amplifier.

There are multiple factor in really world how amplifier behave when driving a particular speaker.

e.g. Tube Amplifier most likely using output transformers which is an energy storage/converter, which helps boosting transitional burst energy when driving a speaker with linear impedances or speakers with capacitive load characteristics such as electrostatic speakers. Also tube amplifier tends to handle overload nicely. That is why people observed that tube amplifier seems be able to drive same speaker louder vs a solid state amp with same “WPC" ratings.

However, tube amplifier would suffer greatly when used to drive low impedance speaker or speakers with non-linear frequency-impedance responses, such as full range ribbon speakers.

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