Vacuum Tubes - Are They Warmer Sounding?
"RapidRonnie" wrote in message
On May 28, 2:08 pm, "Arny Krueger"
wrote:
wrote in message
"In a word: YES...
"The answer is rooted in the harmonic content that the
device can pass or generate..."
There is no question that tubed power amps are inferior
when it comes to passing harmonic content. They are
just too nonlinear and just too limited in terms of
power bandwidth to compare with more modern
alternatives.
As far as the generation of harmonic content goes, it is
unclear why maximizing harmonic content would even be
desirable in a component of a high fidelity system.
Furthermore, if versatile and powerful harmonic content
generation were desired, then the tools of choice would
be from the digital domain.
Properly designed tube amplifiers have entirely
satisfactory bandpass and distortion characteristics.
Well, if you say that for a far higher price and considerably greater
inconvenience, it is possible to have a tubed amp with good performance, I'd
have to agree.
Passing frequencies above 35-50 kHz is very undesireable
in an audio amplifier. Ideally a shallow taper from about
25 kHz and a drop at 50 or so is desirable.
If you include the effects of real-world speaker loads, most tubed amps have
audible issues inside the 20-20 kHz range because of their far higher source
impedance.
Good thing you have nothing to say about the low bad performance of tubed
amps, because all but the really expensive and heavy ones do rather more
poorly in the bass.
Many solid state audio amplifiers work well for RF in the
100-300 kHz range.
That's not typical. Everybody knows that ultrasonic response is an open door
for problems with EMI, etc. Most SS amps have artificially sacrificed high
frequency response to enhance their usability.
That is not a feature, it's a bug. The
output transformer of a tube amplifier beneficially throttles this extreme
HF response.
Throttling the HF response of a SS amp only takes one or two penny-cost
capacitors.
But I will give the majority of tubed amps a nod of sorts for their inferior
power bandwidth below 30 Hz.
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