Tubes? Transistors? Which are better?

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The one that sounds the best to you is the best. Its always been astonishing to me how people will argue over the hardware, when it's the software (music) that we are really trying to appreciate. The best hardware in the wrong room, or set up improperly, will not please the listener. Audiophiles should learn more about acoustics, especially standing waves, nodes, antinodes, reflection speed, backslap, etc., before spending the price of a car on hardware. The biggest problems stem from putting the wrong speakers in a room, and positioning them improperly. In my 25+ years experience, I have found that most loudspeakers with woofers bigger than 8" will overload the average room in the average North American house. Lets face it, we all live in different houses, but they are all basically "standard" in many ways. The furniture industry, the appliance industry, the wall covering industry, carpet industry, window covering industry, etc., have all settled on "standard sizes" for the majority of their core products. Think about this when you try to shoehorn the latest Vomitron 500 loudspeakers with the 4 15" woofers (per channel) into the average living room. I'm not saying the amplifier, tube or transistor, is secondary to the loudspeakers, both items play an equally important role. Getting the acoustics right will bring out the best in any system, tube or transistor, cheap or expensive. I have a colleague who engineers, designs, and installs custom home theatre systems in the $100-250k range. He is always amazed at how easy it is to sell the system, but how difficult it is to sell the customer on the idea of treating the room. Most refuse to spend any mony at all.

I cannot agree with you more. Room acoustics have such a profound affect on a system. No matter how good the equipment, a system's sound can be wrecked by room problems. It is also unfortunate that to correct room problems, one must frequently spend a great deal of money demolishing and then painstakingly reconstructing the room. I also have a colleague in the Home Theater/Stereo System installation business and he tells me the same thing. People are not willing to spend the money on the room, they just want top notch equipment. When the client finally listens to their $150,000 system, they are not pleased. It is then that they finally understand the benefits of room treatments and listening room planning. It makes a great deal of sense to spend the extra money upfront when it is inexpensive to treat the room rather than later. It also makes sense to spend money upfront on elements that are difficult to change. A PreAmp or Speaker can be upgraded later with relative ease, the room is more difficult to upgrade after it has been completed. The absolute WORST thing one can do to a system is equalize or otherwise modify the audio signal. The room should be as transparent as possible - just like all the other pieces of equipment in the signal chain.

A very general response. Tubes in the preamp, transistors in the power amp. Of course it depends on 1000 things not considered in this response.

tubes!tubes!preferably se.transistors sond harsh,especially in electrostatics