Beginner looking for guidance into tube sound.

Hey johnfritter,  no you are definitely not alone.  I am a beginner as well, and on this same intro to tubes journey.  I too have been looking into the similar amps out of China, etc. and some of them sound awesome for the money.

I ultimately decided to pursue Black Ice.

I called Mike at Black Ice, had a long discussion with him today, then  Walter at Underwood.  Both gentlemen are awesome, btw.  I recommend giving them call and see what they have to say.  There’s also a review of the F11 and F22 up on hometheaterhifi.com if you are interested.

I pulled the trigger on the Black Ice F22 tonight!  For now I will use the Peachtree as a DAC until I can determine the next move.  If I end up preferring the Black Ice tube sound, then the Peachtree will get sold and I will buy an external DAC, maybe streamer like you have.  I only stream Tidal & Quboz currently…

Maybe someday I will tread into Carver, Raven, Primaluna et al territory, and some higher sensitivity speakers as well.  Well, I can dream for now anyway.

FYI, I also have a Peachtree Nova 300, and I am running the Black Ice SS-X through the Nova’s loop section.   FWIW, definitely “smoothed” out the sound and makes a difference in the bass as well in my small 8x10ft room.  (there is a whole forum on the SS-X BTW)

We shall see how this experiment turns out!  Best of luck with yours!

The Freya+ is a terrific idea. 6SN7 preamp with a return policy.

Go used & you’ll exponentially more bang for your buck.  You’ll need to take a little time though.  Watch the adds here.  Check EBay too. You’ll see a lot of amps.  People say to be a little more careful. But, plenty of people here have had great experiences.  I have many other bigger ticket things but, not audio stuff yet.  Plus, reading up on all the kinds of Amos you’ll see will give you a better foundation.  Good luck.  And, as long as you’re enjoying music on your
system… nothing else matters.

About 1989, I was going to turn selling my baseball card collection into some very good speakers. Well, I only got $900 from a card dealer, but it was better than nothing. I went to Quintessence Audio In Naperville, IL and listened to one after another speaker for several weeks. I even decided to up my total to $1000 to replace my Allison Ones. I gave it up and sold the AO’s to my college roommate and friend. He still has them and enjoys them. That makes me glad.

To the point, I restarted the same quest but now had a good for the money pair of Paradigms that were large bookshelf size. I did the same thing but took less than several hours listening. in one day. THEN, the dealer put a different preamp in the system. I had a PS Audio SS preamp at the time with a SS amp. This preamp all of a sudden made the music come to life when no speaker seemed to do it for me. After several musical selections, I asked him what made this sound so good? He told me that this preamp was a tube preamp and was THE best sounding one in the store. Turns out that preamp was the Audible Illusions 2D with a very good phono section in it, too. It cost $800 with a small discount Frank gave me. That was my first taste of tubes. I had a Quad 405 SS amp for 28 years with the Mod Squad modifications done about 1/2 way through. The change to the Audible Illusions preamp was the greatest change by far I ever made in my system. The music became a joy everytime I turned it on. That preamp illuminated the sound as good tube components do, but was built to last, too. I had that as the main part of my system happily for over 14 years and changed it only to get the Audible Illusions 3A with the John Curl phono section to be able to use low output MC cartridges.

You mentioned that phono was not happening, but they also make preamps with no phono that sound the same way otherwise. You could get an Audible Illusions 3 used for about $900-1100. Use Audible Illusion matched tube sets (identical tubes that are electrically very close to the same). The other tubes you could get don’t last as long in an AI preamp. I had the AI 3A for another 9 years until I went whole hog and got a sensational preamp (TRL DUDE)--much more money, but I still have it and it is awesome.

Trying to get the sound you’re looking for in other ways at that price may be very difficult. The AI preamps come up for sale now and then on the websites. It will make a bigger difference to your sound than most anything you can do. Keep the SS int. amp and later, you can upgrade just the amp and get better sound. I did that too, but the biggest kick was from the AI preamp.

Bob

I was able to aquire a Prima Luna integrated used for$1200. Plenty of power and sounded very good. So, it's possible.