please clear this up for me...

[shroooooom]

are tube amps more louder in small wattages than solid states? i'm looking at getting a rig to replace my borrowed carvin amp, and i know i want a tube amp for tube sound. however, the one im looking at is $200 more than a solid state and is less than half the wattage. please explain.

[B-string]

Watts are watts. If you have a PA that your bass goes through and you want a tube amp the half wattage won't matter much.
Most name brand SS amps are pretty closely rated, unlike the old days where the truth was really stetched (or Behringer still today).

[beatsbears]

Loudness really depends on a lot of factors. What amps are you looking at?

Never rule out the ol' hybrid amp either. A tube preamp with a decent solid state power amp to push it can make some happy sounds.

[Downunderwonder]

Some factors at play that aren't really related.

1 Tube amps are somewhat of a boutique product these days
2 They use heavy, oldfangled, relatively expensive parts
3 When overdriven they get "pleasingly noisier" if not actually very much louder whereas a SS just distorts horribly.

[Dark Barn]

A watt is a watt, however, amps with tube power will compress your signal in a "natural" sounding way when they get near their output ceiling giving a louder average signal than a SS power amplifier of equal power rating.

There are hybrid amps (tube preamp, SS power) that might give you the tube sound you want also. I personally would only look at tube amps with 200 or more watts but I'm sure you'll get many opinions on that matter. For SS/hybrid amps you can go for as many watts as you can afford imo, no harm in having more than you need if you are sensible about not pushing your speakers to their breaking point.

[madurolover]

A 100 watt marshall tube Guitar amp stays right up with my 500 watt PF500 Ampeg. Watts and loudness are part of it but not all of it. Look at the speaker specification, the effciency is also sensitivity and shown in dB. The higher the number, the more effecient the speaker will be able to produce volume from the signal.

[B-string]

Originally Posted by madurolover

A 100 watt marshall tube Guitar amp stays right up with my 500 watt PF500 Ampeg. Watts and loudness are part of it but not all of it. Look at the speaker specification, the effciency is also sensitivity and shown in dB. The higher the number, the more effecient the speaker will be able to produce volume from the signal.

That is because human hearing is more sensitive at higher frequencies (guitar over bass).

[walterw]

guitar amps don't need nearly as much power to blow away a bass amp. also, old marshalls are way under-rated, to where a "100w marshall" could put out more like 140 watts with a little clipping.

also, the clipping itself is a big part of it; as was mentioned, a typical 100w solid state amp goes up to 100 watts, then starts square-waving as it goes past that, which just sounds bad.

the "100w" tube amp goes up to 100 watts, then starts gradually compressing and distorting in an ear-pleasing and "musical" manner as it goes higher than the 100 watts it was rated for clean. the result is more apparent power from the tube amp.

[Downunderwonder]

Originally Posted by madurolover

A 100 watt marshall tube Guitar amp stays right up with my 500 watt PF500 Ampeg.

Those tinny guitar sounds don't need much power.

[WilliamSandoval]

Originally Posted by madurolover

A 100 watt marshall tube Guitar amp stays right up with my 500 watt PF500 Ampeg. Watts and loudness are part of it but not all of it. Look at the speaker specification, the effciency is also sensitivity and shown in dB. The higher the number, the more effecient the speaker will be able to produce volume from the signal.

Wattage for bass and watage for guitar are completely different. If you compared a 100 watt guitar amp to a 100 watt bass amp, the guitar will be louder regardless of being tube or SS. In my mind a 100 watt guitar amp is equivalent to an 800 watt bass amp volume wise, but there are factors that effect volume in both amps.

[B-string]

Alright....SS amps do not "square wave". The older designs did produce harmonic distortion that was very unpleasing (just like tube OT transformers driven into saturation). If the tube amp is properly designed the harmonic distortion from being overdriven is pleasing (in guitar frequencies, STILL lousy for bass).