"Dennis Moore" wrote in message ...
Cheap bulk jfets being what they are
it only had about one volt of clean output before heavy
second harmonic distortion set in. I even experimented
with using it that way, and padding down the output to hear
different amounts of second harmonic distortion. And it
sounded surprisingly good even when you could see the
distortion on an o-scope. But it wasn't high fidelity and it
wasn't an improvement.

Circa 1979 my roommate, an EE @ MIT, happened into a half dozen old
used McIntosh tube monoblock amps (I think the model was MC30...little
chrome 30 watt jobbers) that needed some TLC. After retubing & biasing
these amps, we brought them into the recording studio for extensive
listening & testing.

The results of both were elucidating:

- These amps measured between 8 & 10% 2nd harmonic distortion!

- And everyone who heard them loved the sound! So much so that my
roommate was able to sell off 4 of the amps for an order of magnitude
more money than he'd bought all 6 for.

No one ever accused these amps of being "broken". Everyone who bought
them considered them an "improvement" over whatever they previously
owned (my roommate kept 2 of the amps to replace his Dynaco 70, & we
both certainly agreed it was a major "improvement").

Was it "high fidelity"? Who cares?