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Old School vs. New School Amplification

#381
While I may be outspokenly stubborn about my own expectations, I also understand different players are working in completely different circumstances, different genre's, widely variable budgets, with a completely different set of priorities.

If I were still schlepping gear to clubs working full time, my priorities might change too.


Korladis said:
No one said that you would. At least not where tube amps are concerned.

Solid state amps don't have quite as many inherently expensive parts as tube amps, and so good ones can be found in that price range.

I prefer tube amps (specific ones, though) for the sounds I'm going for right now. There are lots of SS amps that I think are good and that I could see myself using, at some point, though.
Click to expand...
 
#382
KJung said:
:) I agree with you that every amp sounds different from every other amp, due to hundreds of design decisions and thousands of interactions among components, many of them non-linear.
Click to expand...

Not that kind of sound.
Its just a fact that the italian Class D module which was in that amp we had a Nord Piano connected to, swallowed all overtones, by the way the same module was also in the 500 and 1000 Pumas, Its a fact that a SS amp does sound more dead or if you want more controlled, and seems hollow sounding after you played through a Sadowsky SA200 or a Weber Mywatt a minute before. It does not matter if it is a WT1000, a GlockHR or a Demeter HB600 with the Glock its just much more evident.
Unless you use a 10 grand Crown Class D will not sound as good. this may have changed by now, but its a very good example of new v.s. old technology.
My AER Amp one sound good yes, but it has a similar brittle quality like a little mark II to it.

Old school, if its not to old, is probably better than most new stuff. it has bee around longer times where different too.
We are the guinnepigs for developement these days. most things thrown on the Market ist still halfway in beta status.
That is really bad, also the fact that they are able to create products wich fail, after a predestined time span.
If you place a Part which produces heat next to a part which does not like heat its pretty easy to figure out how much heat it needs to kill the component in lets say 2 years. After it failed its not possible to fix it because its all SMD type boards now. Then its also not worth fixing because a new one is cheap and no one can actually fix it.

what really stupid about this is, first its produces tons of waist including waisted energy to produce and then to recycle all that electroic junk to maher new one out of it. Second you wont get any quality because its needs to be cheap to keep the turn around going, so that you buy more next year.
At the same time you wont get any audio quality because its really difficult and expensive to filter class D amp so that is sounds as good as a good old mosfet amp. That means in the price range of a puma 900 you are probably better of with a Glock. In other words atleat you get something real for your dough.

The Class Ds wich are used to drive subs are quite a bit more expensive than that consumer product called Puma.
There is a reason why these Class D Amps where first used for Subs only.
Just go Iisten to a QSC K12 small PA, its really light and loud, but it sounds like crap to me, and it will sound like crap to most if you AB it with some good Amp, so again its a question of the price and you bet that a "cheap" puma 900 just wont cut it fidelity wise, compared to a really good engeniered more expensive class D amp.
A good conventional Poweramp which most likely is cheaper but also heavyer will sound as good if not better than the expensive Class D.

Get it now ?
 
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#384
Lemon said:
Not that kind of sound.
Its just a fact that the italian Class D module which was in that amp we had a Nord Piano connected to, swallowed all overtones, by the way the same module was also in the 500 and 1000 Pumas, Its a fact that a SS amp does sound more dead or if you want more controlled, and seems hollow sounding after you played through a Sadowsky SA200 or a Weber Mywatt a minute before. It does not matter if it is a WT1000, a GlockHR or a Demeter HB600 with the Glock its just much more evident.
Unless you use a 10 grand Crown Class D will not sound as good. this may have changed by now, but its a very good example of new v.s. old technology.
My AER Amp one sound good yes, but it has a similar brittle quality like a little mark II to it.

Old school, if its not to old, is probably better than most new stuff. it has bee around longer times where different too.
We are the guinnepigs for developement these days. most things thrown on the Market ist still halfway in beta status.
That is really bad, also the fact that they are able to create products wich fail, after a predestined time span.
If you place a Part which produces heat next to a part which does not like heat its pretty easy to figure out how much heat it needs to kill the component in lets say 2 years. After it failed its not possible to fix it because its all SMD type boards now. Then its also not worth fixing because a new one is cheap and no one can actually fix it.

what really stupid about this is, first its produces tons of waist including waisted energy to produce and then to recycle all that electroic junk to maher new one out of it. Second you wont get any quality because its needs to be cheap to keep the turn around going, so that you buy more next year.
At the same time you wont get any audio quality because its really difficult and expensive to filter class D amp so that is sounds as good as a good old mosfet amp. That means in the price range of a puma 900 you are probably better of with a Glock. In other words atleat you get something real for your dough.

The Class Ds wich are used to drive subs are quite a bit more expensive than that consumer product called Puma.
There is a reason why these Class D Amps where first used for Subs only.
Just go Iisten to a QSC K12 small PA, its really light and loud, but it sounds like crap to me, and it will sound like crap to most if you AB it with some good Amp, so again its a question of the price and you bet that a "cheap" puma 900 just wont cut it fidelity wise, compared to a really good engeniered more expensive class D amp.
A good conventional Poweramp which most likely is cheaper but also heavyer will sound as good if not better than the expensive Class D.

Get it now ?
Click to expand...


There was a lot there :woot:
First, let's just agree that one persons good is another persons bad - once again tone is subjective and everyone has a different opinion and products cannot be simply categorized for a good or bad tone by build.
 
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#385
Gab124 said:
There was a lot there :woot:
First, let's just agree that one persons good is another persons bad - once again tone is subjective and everyone has a different opinion and products cannot be simply categorized for a good or bad tone by build.
Click to expand...

hmmm... thats not what Im talking about, almost any one, at least a trained musician standing there will hear that more or less strong ... I hear it faster, than most I know, pretty much instantly. That has something to do with my former job...

NOT the tone of a amp, its simply good or bad done engeniering.
If a amp lacks some thing or produces noise, swallows overtones, does not have the Imageing it should have, most people do not hear things like that, on its own. Set it up with a A/B switch, play the same music through a really good amp, through the same speakers with similar power specs, the flaws will be evident for most people. Now I can hear that instantly because I know how it should sound.

That with the cut overtones was so bad, that my wife said right away that is not good.
Some people buy it and find it geat at first and find out later that there is a flaw. Some People never find out and some people dont buy it, but unfortunately thats the smallest number.
These days, with almost anything you can buy, you must be aware, that very likely someting is wrong with it.

That a class D in the 1000 price range can come up with the same audio quality as a (good) SS or tube amp might be soon the case I dont know. A well built tube or SS amp, with lasting built and high audio quality in mind, is for my understanding probably the most clever way to go for now, at least I have not heard any cheap segment D which has no flaws, and I tryed many. I think this is since the beginning a
quick hype and sell market, you know the pitch "something cool light powerful" and it works.
Look at Markbass orange and black all over the planet, not so much any more now, but I guess he is rich by now...

Its a pretty clear strategy, try to make a hype, then sell a lot of light small boxes with 50 bucks worth of material
in it for 700 bucks each keep it going as long as possible, by making constant new models...
They sold millions of those, the weight and size is great, transport costs are close to nothing, so the gain must be emense.

Now soon every one wants to get rid of them =)

15 or 20 years ago, you would go to a shop buy a really good PA amp and you knew it lasts,
if it does not it could be fixed.
You would plan to use it at leat 10 years.
That made less thrash too.

So much to old and new school from a more critical point of view... :)
 
#386
LiquidMidnight said:
Check it out. *lol*

Click to expand...


Alexander Dumble is a genius! :)
"The more fragile harmonics can survive in vacuum tube, where they seem to be eliminated or squashed in a solid state crystal lattice. It just comes down to that. The physics of it, electrons can survive in a free space vacuum, where they have trouble in a crystal lattice. I think that's the best and simplest I can put it."

I don't know how I didn't see this before! Must have been dust stirred up by a vortex got in my eyes.:)
 
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#388
Getting back to tube vs. solidstate for a moment...............many years ago I brought home an Audio Research SP-9 to compare against my Aragon 24K. It was like night and day to listen to these two against each other. The 24K sounded like music, the SP-9 was harsh, strident, grainy and brittle, basically, all the things my solidstate Aragon was "supposed" to sound like vs. the top model (at the time) Audio Research tube preamp. Hmm..............perhaps Dan D'Agostino knew what he was doing (and still does)? It's not what you use, it's what you do with it.
 
#389
Lemon said:
After it failed its not possible to fix it because its all SMD type boards now. Then its also not worth fixing because a new one is cheap and no one can actually fix it.
Click to expand...


Thats news to me. Just because you or your old school tech do not have the skill set or proper tools to do the job it does not mean that a board assembled with surface mount devices cant be repaired properly or cost effectively.

We do it everyday at work. Including packages that would blow your mind with how complex they are. BGA's, Qfn's DFN's and CSP's are an order of magnitude more difficult to work with than chip caps, resistors and SOIC packages. That is the easy stuff and what most of the components are on a typical amplifier.

It is all about tools and skill set when it comes to repairing SMD devices and most shops dont have either.

A Surface Mount Manufacturing Engineer.
 
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#390
FFTT said:
There was a time when hauling an SVT rig was nothing compared to hauling that Hammond B-3.
Click to expand...
Don't forget the Leslie Cabinet with that B3. I was in a band for a year that hauled a B3, Leslie and large Kutom PA. That was back breaking work every time we played. Now you just throw your Korg or Yamaha in a bag and off you go.
 
#392
Bass4LifeRS said:
Ok, "crazy" question; Must an all tube amp be heavy? I never owned one, but I held a tube in my hand, it wasn't heavy. Is it the transformer that is making it heavy?
Click to expand...
It's the transformers that make tube amps heavy, yes.

That said, there are some pretty light ones now (well, for tube heads). The Peavey VB-3 weighs 37 pounds, and the Mesa/Boogie Prodigy and Strategy weigh 29 and 49 pounds respectively.
 
#393
You can get Volume with any amp, but to get any actual tonal richness there's nothing like Amish Iron.

After my '93 Blues Deluxe was diagnosed terminal not worth fixing.
I had been using it for tracking, but also as a reasonably light weight jam amp for bass.
Zero low end, but loud enough to be heard in one room jams.

I picked up a serious guitar amp.
Part AC100 part Hot Rod Marshall 4X EL34 cooking at about 31 watts each.
Cathode Biased.

69 Pounds for the head alone.

Between original build and about $750.00 in Custom Shop mods,
About $4000.00 into the head.

It's a total one-off, hot rod, Frankenamp.

4 EL 34's ( SED Winged C's) 7 12AX7s, Mullards in V1 & V2

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I used this for bass too, but 100 watts only gives you so much whomp for bass.

Working with a highly sensitive tube amp like this was fundamental in me choosing my Reeves over buying a very clean '72 Blue Line SVT.

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The head is a beast, but the cab can be configured 52 pounds with the EV or 43 Pounds with
two Fanes @ 9 pounds each.
 
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