Tube Power vs Solid State Power

personal experiences- an amplifier's output energy has more to do with the design and quality of an amplifier (and preamplifier) than its power rating, tube or solid state, all else being equal. 

I won't go into explaining why but can confirm that tube power has been more powerful in my experience.  I have had Audio Research 110 wpc mono blocks, 75 wpc and a 150 wpc amps, all tube.  Prior to this I had B&K 250 wpc, Parasound 225 wpc, 350wpc and 750 wpc.  The ARC amps all out performed my solid state examples.  If you went up the quality ladder in SS from my modest examples then less watts would have likely equated to more power.  

In the end, does it matter?

You simply have to try out different components and find what works in your system for your ears.

What that WATT sounded like, when it was used, that's a different story.

THEN not all watts are created equal, ay?

Steve Deckert of Decware uses the motto - "If the first watt sucks, why continue?

I have been a tube amp user for the last 4 years - specifically a flea watt amp. I love the sound, and the 2.3 wpc are BIG watts, in that, I very seldom need more volume for my listening level preferences. But, matching speakers must be pretty efficient - preferably above 94 dB sensitivity. There is so much detail and a lot of space around the instruments. It is very "involving" musically.

But...a short while back, I became interested in early 70’s SS amps, and decided to get one. I ended up finding a '71 Sansui integrated, that had been fully restored. Truth be told, I just loved it cosmetically (AU-222 black face, mini) and really got it more as a novelty than anything else.

Folks - I was ill-prepared for what happened when I hooked that puppy up! Like I stated above, my speakers are high efficiency (open baffles) and the Sansui (18 wpc - 8 ohm) just blew me away. Not only does it crank like the devil, but it sounds spectacular.

It is evident that the level of clarity is not on par with my tube amp, but, to me anyway, the sound can be more natural, and I find myself wanting to come back to it over the tubes more and more.

Anyway, I love both the tubes and the SS, and you really don’t have to choose one or the other - you can have both for a completely different sound. But when I listen to the Sansui, I think about John Peel, saying that a guy was trying to convince him that CD’s were better than vinyl because they had no surface noise. His answer was "listen mate, life has surface noise."

My point (I guess) is that sometimes, the more clarity you have, the less natural it is. After a few years of trying, I finally decided that I did not like high definition recordings (in general) because, what they gain in clarity, they lose in realness.

It's not 20 watts on a tube amp vs. on a SS amp. It's 20 watts on any amp vs any other amp. Watts per channel is measured under certain conditions which can be varied to get to the desired marketing result of a spec.

You need to listen to the amps you are comparing, ignore the specs, unless they tell you some situation where they won't work, like speaker sensitivity under 90dB. If you never turn it up, maybe you'll like tubes.