The Future of Audio Amplification

georgehifi is the poster who has no technical counter argument.  

The trolls have infiltrated this forum now.  Too bad.  It maybe shut down soon by moderators.  Happens all over audiogon forums.   

While I have a dedicated listening room I built 25 years ago, I made some major errors in construction.  It is good that it has a 6" rebar reinforced slab, 8" plates with staggered 6" studs every 8".  Survived a 6.9 earthquake with no damage (or to the rest of house).  However, I also made it vaulted from 8' to 11'6", have large multi-pane wood casement windows along both long walls and behind the speakers and dual layers of screw attached, non-staggered jointed 5/8X drywall on walls and single layer on ceiling.  Also, the room designed to have 25,000 records now has 42,000 records.  I was able to tweak the acoustics to sound very good.  Without treatment, slap echo galore but definitely no problem with sound in or out of the room.

In 2 months, I'm moving to another home and will convert 2 of 4 oversized garages dedicated as a sound room.  No windows, flat high ceiling, superior insulation   Sure, it's 40% smaller space but at least it will be dedicated to sound only and built better for it than in 1993.  The records/cds will be stored in the adjacent room.  We will have a large family room for video and a small audio system in the large living room.  I would have built a dedicated larger listening room but for the 2017 City of LA law cutting in half the floor area ratio. 

That small living room system has a small high end CD player, really small sub-miniature tube pre-amp and a voltage regulated (non-ultralinear) redesigned Dynaco ST70.  Fits on a small rack.  Almost like a streaming setup size.  Only the speakers are medium size Legacy Signature IIIs.

Plasma TV has a tube like sensitivity in warmth, color and engaging the viewer. I’ve moved on to top of the line LCD TVs with higher resolution and brightness, a solid state like sensitivity. OLED TV is similar to a combination of the two prior technologies.   

Each type has its own limitations (LCD-picture uniformity, viewing angle, OLED-brightness in white scenes, motion judder Plasma-heat , resolution).

This month's Stereophile has the Cary and the Cambridge integrated back to back reviewed.  The Cambridge received an outstanding Atkinson review and quite good listening review.  We know what the Cary received.

The first time I got so excited that I danced to a music system was when I was about 5 listening to a six way mono really big box speaker through Heathkit tube gear in 1961 listening to Dvorak Slavonic Dances and Brahms Hungarian Dances on Capitol.

Since then, I have experienced many excitable recordings.  Even my wife claps after a really great recording/performance.  The most recent was In A Jazz Orbit by Bill Holman and Tchaikovsky Sym. No.1 with Michael Tilson Thomas and Boston Sym.   Toe tapping (former) and jumping up and down fun music (last movement latter).

I’m using all tube preamp and amp gear, Class A/B. However, at several audio shows, I heard relatively decent Class D amps. One that stood out was from PranaFidelity. http://pranafidelity.com/index.php/reviews/ Using my CDs in an EAR player and his electronics and speakers, my jazz and classical sounded very enjoyable and I could listen for an extended period of time. It wasn’t as good as my home systems or more expensive systems I heard, but it was musical. More than I can say for any Magico speaker demo I’ve heard in five years. If Class D ever became as good as my big tube amps, I’d be interested but not as of today.

I’ve heard tube preamps (e.g. EAR 912) with big SS amps (Bryston 28 cubed) sound very good, even excellent on demanding speakers. I don’t know if I would like an all SS system though. The ones I’ve heard over the years just lacked something. The PranaFidelity was using a tube (and warm sounding) CD player which may have made the difference using an SS preamp and Class D amp.

My best friend uses a Channel Islands Class D amp and he is comfortable using it.  He would like to substitute one of my Class A/B voltage regulated amps which can control the bass of his demanding speakers instead but can't afford the change.  He is a very discerning audiophile and part time remastering engineer (worked with Kevin Gray on some top quality LP remasterings over the years).  So, he is satisfied for now with even the older technology Class D amp.   I've mentioned that I heard the Prana Class D amp and it was musically involving and sounded very good.