Solid State vs. Tubes - What if Transistors came first?

I’m dead serious.

>>>>>In that case I really don’t get it.

All the important music ever made was recorded and mastered with tubes. By logical deduction all the unimportant music ever made was recorded and mastered using transistors.

maritime51,

They are not dead. They are on life support.

geoffkait,

">>In that case I really don’t get it."

I know. You do prove my point. It is above average. Not everyone can get it. I am sorry, I cannot help you.

Yeah, really. Tubes won’t be around much longer. 🚽

By logical deduction all the unimportant music ever made was recorded and mastered using transistors.

It may be a whirlpool of words, but it is still very incorrect in any logical sense. Not to mention unimportant music. Jimi Hendrix at Woodstock is quite unimportant. Just ask a different heap of the 20-year-olds.

maritime51,

Do not be so pessimistic. Tubes are resilient. They may last up to 3-4 years. Also, do not underestimate the fashion factor. Resurgence of tubes coincides with cycle that brings bell-bottoms back. Just look around yourself. It is all full of tubes. At least according to this thread.

Geez, glupson, all my LOLs are turning to WTFs. 

Well, now you know how all of us feel about you. By the way, if you are really interested in important music these days, it is BTS. I have no idea how they are recorded, if they are even recorded at all.

Are you channeling the dude from Taxi Driver now?  If so you’re good!

What dude? I do not drive a taxi.

BTS are big. At this point, way bigger than Jimi Hendrix.

I am going to see BTS on September 29th!!

Well, if dale is going to see them they must be big. I didn’t realize Bachman Turner Overdrive was still performing.

dave_b,

I was trying to get tickets but it was not that easy. In short, I failed. As a consolation prize, there is a sweater.

geoffkait,

What you saw on Wikipedia does not give you a sense how big BTS really are.

I got 6 count em 6 tubes in my ARC pre-amp.

This is as far as tubes got in my system.

They sound very good and different but not better than my all digital Class D integrated amp in the other system that convinced me when it comes time for the next pre-amp change the tubes may be gone altogether.

I had two mhdt DACs, similar design, one with tube output stage and one without. I still have the one with no tube. I found I was rolling tubes to get the tube DAC to sound like the non-tube one. So goodbye tube. Those looking for a softer warmer sound would have liked the tube DAC better at least for acoustic instruments but enjoyment of electronic music suffered. Different strokes......

I have one pair of small monitors that are tube friendly.   I might give that a shot someday just for something a little different.

QED. -Lee Deforest. 👌

BTW there is something to be said for the less obtrusive sound of soft clipping tube amps. Class D amps seem to commonly do that nice trick these days though as well.  As do a handful of others.


Hard versus soft clipping might be more relevant to how good gear commonly sounds in comparison than tube versus SS.  Any thoughts on that?

Jesus, how often do you encounter clipping?  -Lee Deforest. 

Glupson, my daughter is a huge fan so me and the wife are taking her for her first big concert!  Got the tx as soon as they were released online...expensive!!

Of course we have taken her to see the Philadelphia Symphony Orchestra at the Kimmel Center!  

dave_b,

Your daughter is one lucky girl. I was buying it for my friend's daughter who would fly to U.S.A. from Europe just for concert. European tickets had been long gone. Now, tell your daughter it is unimportant music and see what look you get. While you are at that, ask her about tubes. They are all the rage among younger crowd, I hear.

She enjoys blasting BTS in my new RAM 1500 Limited with Harmon Kardon 900 Watt 19 speaker surround sound system. The subwoofers rattle our bones...great fun!  No tubes involved

I got as far as, “My understanding is...” 😀

“When I was alive, I concluded tubes sucked.”  -Lee Deforest

geoffkait,

I got as far as, “My understanding is...”

It is fun learning new things. Less you know, more fun it is. Try it.

Dear Lee,

You would not like to come back and find yourself in the middle of a tubes Renaissance Period. You know, like those events from 500 years ago. Lots of art, a little less technology.

You’re right, glubson. It is fun learning new things. But I like learning new things that are true. Not logical fallacies from newbies and wannabes. But that’s probably a difference between us, you know, just going by what you say. 

geoffkait,

Not reading past "My understanding is..." makes it difficult to know how true the rest of the writing was. That surely is the difference between us although I hope it is not the main one.

For now, I would like to recommend some good reading about matters discussed...

https://www.amazon.com/Best-Sellers-Books-Childrens-Rock-Mineral/zgbs/books/3278

#7 is a true gem.

I wrote the book on crystals. Oops, I forgot you can’t read. Never mind.

Where could I get that book? Does it have ISBN? I am interested.

geoffkait, stop hating and baiting...its unbecoming!

And, like murder, the truth will out....

Cryptic unfinished sentences from hipster posters are cool...

Tubes are cool. Yin and Yang of audiophile world in just one item. So warm and yet so cool...

“Tubes suck,”. Lee Deforest, channeled by the Kat thingy. 

Too bad De Forest’s hearing was shot by the time transistor radios came out. Otherwise he would have said, Yikes! Transistors suck!

Uh, in Hades, his punishment is to stand in the lake of boiling blood, listening to a tube amp, err, imp.  

Did Teletubbies have anything to do with this debate?

<brayeagleerik wrote:  ". . . Peter Walker’s conclusion was that all well-designed amps operated below clipping will sound the same."

A Peter Azcel posit? (The Audio Critic)>

You can also add Alan Shaw (Harbeth) to that already esteemed list.

However, Ken Rockwell back in 2015 posted a technically logical explanation why tube amps are often preferred.

https://kenrockwell.com/audio/why-tubes-sound-better.htm

Pseudoscience, speculation and conjecture, sprinkled with subjective horse poop. 

Tubes are dead. Lee Deforest, somewhere in the Lake of Boiling Bloid. 

One thing Peter Walker didn’t have the good sense to do was produce the Quads without that abominable looking and horrible sounding rattletrap of a metal grating on the front and back of the speakers. I mean, come on, people!  No wonder he thought all amps sound the same.

I simply don't understand how one can conclude that dragging a diamond through a plastic trough doesn't cause wear. It defies logic, physics, and study.

It does wear, but takes a *lot* longer than the studies done in the early 1960s concluded (which are the studies most often cited in this regard). A lot has happened with cartridges and tone arm tech since then!! Most audiophiles I know don't listen to any one title long enough to actually wear it out; IMO this just simply isn't an issue.

There are ways to get clipping characteristics out of a transistor that are similar to a tube. It's just not done often.

The way to do it is to use SITs (Static Induction Transistors) aka VFETs. They have linearity similar to triodes and do have a soft clipping characteristic. They are the only such devices that have these properties other than real triodes. The problem is no-one makes them anymore, and further, no-one ever made driver and low level signal versions- just outputs. They've not been made since the late 70s or early 80s. The industry doesn't want to make linear devices anymore- everything is 'switching' to switching. That's why class D is on the rise. 

The ’ages’ of an audiophile. In the first age (the beginning) the ’audiophile to be’ has superb hearing acuity, no money, an inexpensive SS system, and he is happy until he acquires some knowledge, money, and for many, a divorce.

Middle age occurs. He still has pretty good hearing, has more money, buys better equipment, and discovers why tube equipment sounds so good. He now obsesses over all things, buys tube equipment, rolls tubes endlessly, and can avoid all of the nasties from digital stuff. Etc.

The last stage begins with the onset of advanced age. His hearing acuity is substantially degraded by a sloping of high frequencies, digital stuff is no longer as intrusive, the loss of the benefits of ’tube sounds’ has become apparent so he questions whether or not he should downgrade his system and return to SS equipment. Probably a good thought!

Questions for today, 1) Are most advocates of SS sound old fellas? 2) Why do many manufacturers and sellers of SS stuff say (in its ads) its warm (to some degree or another) and sounds like tubes. Rarely do they say it ’sounds’ like SS? (I did note that the designer/manufacturer of the Kinki amp which is so much talked about here did in fact say that his amp was not warm, a rare bit of honesty I think.

More pseudoscience, speculation and conjecture predicated upon ad hominems. Shame on you.

You cite nothing other than your worthless, methane imbued ipse dixit. 💩

Many, I suspect, like me left tubes in the late sixties, and have used solid state ever since, hence your non sequitur.  Regardless of physiologic changes, tubes suck. -Lee Deforest

maritime51, did I step on your little pinky?  Speaking about worthless contributions..............:-)

I agree, your so called contribution is simple minded palaver. 

"1) Are most advocates of SS sound old fellas?"

What would be some approximate cut-off for this?

At the same time, some people advocate for solid state equipment because of convenience and ease of use.