2. amps-preamps
  3. 1360263273

Who makes the highest quality tube amps?

One scale of 1-10, 10 being best designed and constructed technically, personal sound preferences aside, who are the 8s, 9s, and 10s?

VAC, ARC, Atmasphere would seem like likely candidates I can think of. Are they ?

Where does Decware rank? Rogue? How about others?

SOme technical facts to help support any claims is appreciated please.

Durability and reliability matters to me here as much as anything. I would want my tube gear to continue to work as reliably as designed years down the road as well as up front.

THanks.

Thanks.
128x128mapman
mboldda1's avatar
mboldda1
575 posts
 
nobody mentioned mastersound, unison research, viva
atmasphere's avatar
atmasphere
11,794 posts
 
Collatio - First True Class A SE OTL Amplifier
This is most certainly false. Single ended OTLs have been around for decades and by definition are class A.
believehifi's avatar
believehifi
4 posts
 
All tube OTL amplifiers use SEPP, cyclotron or Mr. Futterman’s variations. All these are push-pull amplification stages. They can claim single ended, but they are push pull topologies. Feedback is mandatory in this designs to cancel out the artifacts generated by the problems of not true complimentary driving of the signal, and of course cross-over distortion. Some clever variations have been presented on the market during recent years, but they are nevertheless push pull topologies with many dbs of negative feedback, some of them use up to 60db of degenerative feedback. Of course, these amplifiers are not Class A devices.
stevecham
3,340 posts
 
Manley Labs and conrad johnson.
bigby
150 posts
 
BAT - Balanced Audio Technology.
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