Is All Tube Worth It?

[seamonkey]

Please, go ahead then. You've mentioned before that you have the tools to do so, correct?

I don't have the amp, And if I did find interaction, who would believe it? That's why I've lucked out when UncleFluffy volunteered. I do believe he has the knowledge, skills and objectivity. It's just a matter of having the time. Time is not cheap.

In the meantime, pointing out that they're there may help somebody wanting to buy a tube amp to say well I better go check out an compare Fender, Tranyor, Peavey, ... or Boutique.

 

[packhowitzer]

i played and svt 4 (SS) for years longing for the day when i could afford to upgrade to an svt2 (tube). that day came and i put the svt2 into a standalone wooden case that basically makes it nonrackmount. The total weight: 91lbs. It was always killing my back, but it was the amp i was determined to play for every gig after saving for so long to get it. It sounds great. Especially when the tubes are warmed up just right. It just sings and howls through my 2 mesa 4x10s. BUT it doesn't always sound the same. The bias on the back needs constant tweeking and I find myself pulling out the svt4 (with a Sansamp RBI for warmth) more and more. It's just more reliable for the road. The svt2 has a place of honor in my studio, but I just can't lug it to gigs anymore. I've recently gotten into class d amps and my GK mb500 just always has a good sound for me. no tweeking no dialing it in and no hoping the humidity and temp are just right for my tubes to sing.

 

[seamonkey]

I see that you either missed or avoided the point of my post. Anyhow, most pro sound engineers know the correct and well-established procedure to mic a Leslie through the FoH. With correct mic placement you can absolutely capture the close-up horn doppler effect. This has never posed a problem for Jon Lord, Keith Emerson, Rick Wakeman, Booker T. playing the biggest halls on the planet. Never heard (or heard of) them?

Anyhow, it needs to be made clear that you are espousing your own personal opinion in this case, as opposed to actual fact.

I didn't mean to take it off topic. Yes, I've heard those players, and more, real B3 with Leslies. The older studio recorded albums where they put the Leslie in the stereo field sound, where you can hear it swirling around the room, sounds so much better than the older live albums to me.


We all have opinions. It's the internet.

 

[seamonkey]

im sure jimmy could record a bit with his b-15/svt and me with my modifyed bassman/valve jr

Search this board. Jimmy already did recordings of different amps, pedals, etc. and statistically people couldn't tell a difference.

Then the argument of the "feel" of the amp comes out. The old IEEE paper didn't mention "feel" form the guitar players. So a real double blind would have to be done by each player with amps behind an opaque barrier, to see if they hear or feel a difference.

In the meantime if you have a decent PC, or iPad run over to IK and pick up Amplitube free. You can try out many of their amps for a couple of days. They have SS and Tube, i.e. GK, Orange, Ampeg, ... more coming all the time. Some of the Amps are from the maker of the Amps own personal collection. Getting the golden reference for the modeled amp is always a hard choice for the model maker.

 

[AwkwardLoudness]

A reliable tube amp with great tone is certainly worth it especially if you have excellent speakers cab(s) to complement the amp. The weight doesn't bother me; one of my amps is 85 lbs. The maintenance with swapping tubes doesn't bother me either.

However, I'd take a good SS or hybrid amp over a crappy all tube amp though.

 

[coreyfyfe]

My point is one person who could hear artifacts that were unatural to the sound, actually a broken amp. Nobody likes IM distortion, unless you're a robot. There I go again with "nobody"

"Listening tests indicate to causes for differences in perceived sound of tube and transistor guitar amplifiers. These are ripple intermodulation distortion and frequency response differences caused by the reactive speaker load interaction with the output impedance of the amplifier. Although ripple intermodulation distortion is easily detected by trained listeners, only one of seventeen test subjects was able to detect it without tranining. The change in frequency response caused by the high output impedance of the tube amp is by far the predominant cause for differences.

The differences in speaker damping were not detected by the listeners. Also not detected were the differences in the harmonic content of an overloaded signal in teh power amplifiers."

Aside from the guy who picked out the IM distortion, the other test subjects were able to reliably tell there was a difference, but not reliably pick which one was which. I agree that it's a statistically insignificant number of study participants; however, they were able to detect a difference between the two on more than just a distortion level.

 

[chadds]

Actually.
I realized that I want the amp to sound like I want it to sound. If I peer inside and it's powered by Lionel Trains then so be it.
Sometimes in my career a lowly Polytone fit the bill. At other times a Marshall Major on a flatback SVT cab. (what a sound!)
So an exercise concerning whether one can sound like the other doesn't have me making music.

 

[Passinwind]

I don't have the amp, And if I did find interaction, who would believe it? That's why I've lucked out when UncleFluffy volunteered. I do believe he has the knowledge, skills and objectivity.

OK, thanks for admitting that you have don't any credibility here. That's a shame though, IMHO.

 

[faceinbass]

ss=milk,.. while tubes=cream, IMHO.

Nicely put.

 

[LiquidMidnight]

yeah about this IEEE test. First off 12 people is hardly a realistic statistical pool to draw conclusions from. If I got 12 people in a room and asked them their birthdates, I am pretty sure at least a few clumps would occur around various astrological signs. We all know Libras and Sagitarians are more likely to respond to CL ads for focus groups right? So if we have 3 libras and 2 Sagitarius, that leaves only 7 people to represent the other 10 signs of the zodiac. Of course there will be at least 3 left out.
So our little test to find out how zodiac sign affects tapioca preference is out the door!
When I worked in market research a study was a failure if we could not get a statistical base that numbered in the low thousands. When we collected data we screened participants to be sure our sample matched the composition of the population.
White males aged 35-50 never want to participate. Females over 60 and males/females under 25 were no problem.
When evaluating for audio you would want to be sure to cover several age groups. Age affects hearing. You would also want to screen for occupational disqualifiers. Jack hammer operators, punch press operators etc, would likely have impaired hearing.
With a sample as low as 12 I cant help but think this was the typical kind of conference hijinks that are used to lighten up the often dry proceedings. Hee hee can YOU tell tube from soild state? Besides, this kind of thing belongs in AES not IEEE.

PS I do not condone the usage of astrological signs for divination or decision making. But Aries are all jerks.

From what I gathered from the results, the investigator used a within-subjects design, which would allow him to cut down on the sample size for statistical power purposes - it would also create internal validity problems if he didn't counter-balance between the participants with regard to the order in which they were exposed to the different levels of the independent variable.

But still, you are abolustely right: the sample size is still way too small, and any outliers are going to have a large impact on the mean scores of the study.

Man, the self-selection in the market research you did must have played hell on samping error.

 

[agedhorse]

for repair purposes, i love the fact that i can diagnose much easier on a tube amp. SS tends to be a "well, buy a new one" where as tube amp parts can easily be found/replaced.

again, this is from MY experience. i've built a couple amps for both guitar and bass and i've salvaged several tube amps (Hot Rod Deville & Dexluxe Reverb) but every solid state amp i've tried to fix has been met with fried circuits that i had to send back to the manufacturer to replace. (headache).

IME, it's usually just as easy to repair a solid state amp as it is a tube amp (sometimes easier) provided you have the experience, understanding and correct tools.

Regarding replacing circuit boards, generally that's not the case for a good tech, but there are instances where it's less costly to do so... especially as class D power amps are shrinking the size and weight down to more manageable levels for the average player. It's not that they can't be repaired at the component level, it just doesn't make financial sense to do so.

 

[LiquidMidnight]

It was accounted for, but as Cal hinted towards the overall sample size was dismal. Nothing near statistical significance IMO. You can get a retype of the full text Invalid Link Removed

Thanks, bro!

 

[atauntaun]

Besides the best bass players are hefty guys and/or tall guys.
Who's with me!

That's right. You need to "be" your tone....big and round. At least that's why I tell my wife I can't go running with her

 

[Count Bassie]

I prefer tube amps. The only thing stopping me from going that route is that I'm not sure if a 300 watt tube head will keep up volume wise with what I'm used to, which is basically a 700 watt power amp in front of an RBI.

Well, an SVT turned up pretty high is going to approach the place where your hearing can start to suffer. A tube amp, a good one, that pushes 300 watts is pretty freaking loud. It's certainly all I'll ever need, anywhere.

Not that the 700 SS watts isn't. (Edit)

 

[Korladis]

Now we go off into the reliability issue. MTBF, etc.

There's megamillion cell phones, TV's, computers, ... all built the same way. AFAIK - there are no more TV's that use tubes, and they all switched because of reliability problems. That's just one industry.

Actually, I'd venture to guess it's more due to size than reliability. Tube TV's are bigger, heavier, etc. They're not any more unreliable than newer TV's. In my experience, less so, actually.

 

[Floyd Eye]

Well, an SVT turned up pretty high is going to approach the place where your hearing can start to suffer. A tube amp, a good one, that pushes 300 watts is pretty freaking loud. It's certainly all I'll ever need, anywhere.

Not that the 700 SS watts isn't. (Edit)

I have a very loud band. I could actually use a little more power now.

 

[pie_man_25]

I'm just chiming in, been reading this for a while now, this is my first post in this thread, as far as I can remember. I don't have much experience - I've only been playing for four years, and I'm no engineer though I have a simple grasp on electronics. I have to say that I don't really care what's in my amp nearly as much as it meets a few criteria:
1) it works and doesn't break.
2) I can lift it with both arms.
3) it sounds good

I think both solid state and tubes, if made right, will work well and not break. I think whether or not the amp works is the most important part of the amp - you can make do if it sounds bad or if it's heavy, but if it doesn't work consistently then there's no point in owning it.

Part two is important, but slightly less important - I could lift an 80 pound SVT with both arms, but of course if it's really heavy you can make do and perhaps use a dolly or a cart to carry it from point a to point b, but if you can't lift it at all what's the point in owning it? Of course, most cabs have wheels on them, so you tend to only need to carry them up stairs and the like.

Part three is important, afterall if you don't like how it sounds why play it? Of course, this is also very subjective - I've heard that jazz guitarists tend to play through solid state because it provides a lot of clean response. I personally like to think of tubes as "characteristic" and solid state as more "obedient" - tubes compress and overdrive in a very characteristic way, and it's almost mandatory that you push them (at least in a guitar context, please correct me if I'm wrong on the bass part) so that they get a very characteristic drive. Solid state is different though, it's much more "obedient", it doesn't necessarily have a characteristic "tone", it doesn't compress itself naturally, and doesn't clip or distort in a way that is pleasing, therefore it's "sweet spot" is when the amp isn't being pushed - where you can play it's hospital clean tones to use.

I presonally have a slight preference to solid state for a few reasons - solid state amps tend to be lighter, cheaper, and more durable to my experience. I've always known tubes to need sometimes expensive replacement and can sometimes be finnicky, of course there are also very finnicky solid state amps. Of course I'd take a good tube amp over a bad or mediocre solid state amp any day of the week, and I'm willing to say my opinion can change over time, but I'm more than content with my solid state amp and I'm not going to change it any time soon.

 

[Count Bassie]

I have a very loud band. I could actually use a little more power now.

Get a little rack of power amps and some tubes in front. And some ear plugs, for you and your friends...

 

[Floyd Eye]

Believe me, the most likely next upgrade will include a ginormous power amp and some new cabs. I doubt if a tube pre will get me much closer than I am already with the RBI.

 

[aborgman]

i think it's really dopey that so many people have this misconception that only people looking for distortion use tube amps. do you know why the svt was invented? so people could have a tube amp with clean headroom and still be able to play loudly.

Not exactly.

It wasn't:

"so people could have a tube amp with clean headroom and still be able to play loudly"

it was:

"so people could have an amp with clean headroom and still be able to play loudly"

Tubes were just the best way they found of doing it at the time.

that 3% or 5% or whatever distortion stat? that only comes into play when your cranking pretty loudly.

Nope, I'm afraid not.