Tube amp

I've been using VTL 450MKII tube amp with my B&W 801S3 for years. I also have a not often used Jolida 1000a intergrated amp that uses EL-34's tubes.  

The VTL is smooth with good bass and is in line with modern high powered tube amps.  The Jolida reminds me of 60's tube gear, very lush and warm.  My comments are based on my related gear and room conditions.

That's interesting because your speakers are identical to mine. I'm not a loud music listener. Occasionally, very occasionally I may turn it up a bit but I don't think I've ever pushed my Levinson much over half tilt. To my music sounds best at modest volumes and not where my ears bleed lol. That's where considering some of the cheaper Chinese stuff comes in to play. If I have a 60wpc amp, but am only listening at a few watts, how will it perform. Do you use a tube pre as well or ss? Thanks for your input as well. I'm going to look into as options.

Hi,
Generally speaking the B&W 801 seems designed with solid state amplifiers in use driving them. They dip to 3 ohm impedance at some frequencies and have a difficult phase angle in the mid bass region. So it appears that they need a high current transistor amplifier.

However in some cases actual use provide outcomes not predicated by measurements and specifications. There are likely some tube amplifiers that could successfully drive this speaker (the VTL 450 mentioned above by vegasears). With tube amplifiers it is most probably a case by case proposition. No question that some and possibly many  tube amplifiers may struggle with this particular speaker load.

My suspicion is that most owners of these speakers drive them with high current transistor amplifiers given their load characteristics.
Charles

I use a McIntosh C2500 tubed pre-amp.

@luvrockin   Very familiar with your 801s, all 3 of the series. I do not question the use of a tube amp, but ime, as Charles indicated, always driven with beefy ss. Are you happy with your system, musically ( not talking visually ) ? I have always recommended with the series 3 vertical biamping.

@Mrdecibel, First off to answer your question, I love how my system sounds and I'm very happy with it but I'm sideways looking for ways to improve. I guess I always like to mix things up a bit being the fact I love the hobby and like to play. I never considered biamping for a couple reasons. I really don't know much about it. Also, I'm sure the cost would be pretty substantial. My preamp has on two balanced outputs for left and right. There is one for center as well but wouldn't use that. How would I bring signal to a second amp? I'd have to purchase another set of interconnects, speaker cables which I'd think would have to match? What a suggestion for a second amp for bi-amping. I have a Levinson 23.5 which puts out 200wpc. Would that be used to power low frequency or high? How much power would the second amp have to be? 

When someone says to me, "they are happy with their system", but are always looking to upgrade, this tells me, they are not happy with their system, whatever that might be. This is fine. The audio roller coaster never stops. Vertical biamping is when you have 2 of the same stereo amplifier, with each one driving just 1 speaker ( an amp channel for the woofs, the other for the mid/tweeter ). High quality y connects are available, but, you would need additional ics and speaker cable. IME, this gave me the best results. Horizontal biamping, as you are speaking of, is also common, but using a 2nd of the same amp is still preferred ( for many reasons ) imo/ime. Impedance, sensitivity and gain would be critical, for the 2nd amp, whether used for bottom or top. I understand the upgrade bug.

Most of the 801s I've seen work pretty well with tubes, although you need some power to make them go, but in that regard 100 watts seems like enough. We have several customers using 801s, mostly using our MA-1 amplifier. So that sounds like a pretty tube- friendly speaker to me.

I use a 38-watt tube integrated on enormous vintage B&Ws that are 91 dB efficient and dip to 3 ohms in the midbass.  The speakers were certainly designed to pair with high-current, high-wattage solid state.

The combo works for me, though I don't have a lot going on below about 50Hz.  If you can live without low bass and midbass slam, tubes may make you very happy.  My imaging and detail retrieval does not suck.

A friend of mine had his B&W 801s paired with Cary SLM-100 monoblocks (w/ Audible Illusions modulus 3 preamp) for many years. Not sure which series but this was at least 10 years ago, I thought they sounded great until he switched them with a pair of Parasound JC1 monos and we both agreed the difference was transformational. I don't want to say night and day but pretty darn close, especially for large orchestral music. Even listening to jazz trios late at night (after kids and wife are at bed!) at low volume had a bit more heft and sounded fuller.
Just one more data point, FWIW.