Tube watts vs Solid State watts

[MobileHolmes]

Mostly agreed. There are a handful of SS amps that break up musically, but not a ton. Another way to think of it is that if you had 200 watts of tube or solid state, most people wouldn't be tapping the full 200 watts from the SS because it sounds bad, whereas they will run the tube closer to 200 because it still sounds good

 

[Spectre Gunner]

Does the state of California know that the chemicals and ink used to make these labels cause cancer? View attachment 3354369[/QUOTE]

 

[edencab]

25 watts at a guitar’s frequency range is insanely loud.

25 watts at a bass’s frequency range is not loud at all. Won’t even bother your neighbors.

Reason is is that it takes a lot more power to drive a speaker cone to the excursions necessary to create those bass frequencies. A lot more power. Some say at least 10X the watts. Probably more.

You can use Google search to research the tubes vs solid state thing. Probably will get a lot of listings to your query from here

so would a guitar through a 25 watt bass amp be insanely loud? ( I don't have a guit to check)

 

[mbell75]

Think about it. Most of Rock ‘n Roll was inspired, written, and performed using tube watts. If you want to totally nail that old sound, you need to use the same tube watts. It’s as simple as that.




I don't need a whole lots 'a money
I don't need a big, fine car
I got everything that a man could want
I got more than I could ask for
Now, I don't have to run around
I don't have to stay out all night
'cause I got me a sweet, a sweet lovin' tube amp
And she knows just how to treat me right

Well my baby, she's all right
Well my baby, she's clean out of sight, don't you know that
She's
She's sounds some kind 'a wonderful
She's sounds some kind 'a wonderful yes she

Well considering SS amps didn’t really start to become more plentiful until the 70s, the originanators of rock n roll had no choice but to use tube amps. I also play guitar and bass is a different animal. There are dozens of quality SS bass amps out there and one would be hard pressed to tell them from tube amps. There are only maybe 2 good SS guitar amps I can think of and 98% of them do not sound like tube amps at all and easy to hear a difference. Bass frequencies are much easier to work with.

 

[hennessybass]

My 300 watt tube SVT-VR head into my 6x10 Ampeg cabs was a revelation when I first plugged them in.

I was blown away because my 1200 watt SVT 4 Pro that I had for years playing into the same cabinet was aenemic in comparison.

This is a great example of one of the huge missing pieces in the tube vs. SS wats description. The actual amp. The watts is just one small component of the overall amp design - and how the amp is designed to make use of its watts.

The experience above probably has a lot to do with how the amp is designed to sound (voicing), and not with how many watts the amp has.

 

[beans-on-toast]

Well considering SS amps didn’t really start to become more plentiful until the 70s, the originanators of rock n roll had no choice but to use tube amps. I also play guitar and bass is a different animal. There are dozens of quality SS bass amps out there and one would be hard pressed to tell them from tube amps. There are only maybe 2 good SS guitar amps I can think of and 98% of them do not sound like tube amps at all and easy to hear a difference. Bass frequencies are much easier to work with.

Good thing that they didn’t wait for solid state technology to improve. Nobody ever did that at any point along the technology timeline, they worthed with what th y had available. But there’s no question that those amps were part of the sound and did inspire some of what was being written. Just as it does today.

You can’t hold back rock ‘n’ roll.

One interesting point. Solid state recording, both mixing desks and tape recorders, and later DAW’s, quickly took over when they were introduced. That part of the process was generally not in the hands of the artists but they liked it. Reliability over tube based studio recording equipment was a big factor.

 

[Coolhandjjl]

Voicing is just part of the equation. It’s the sum of a lot of things.

Best just to accept that a tube head will outperform a ss head in many situations. (Notice that I didn’t say all situations)

 

[Gravel Gertie]

A watt is a watt. I have close to 30 amps ranging in power from 12.5 watts to 2,500 watts. The volume they produce is pretty consistent with their power rating. However, many of the tube amps do not actually make their full power before they begin to distort. I have one 200W amp that really only makes about 120W clean and another that makes about 165W. Even the iconic SVT with is supposed to make 300W at 3% THD per the factory service manual typically only makes about 265W at 5% THD. My 380W solid state GK amps will easily play clean louder than both of my SVTs pushed into heavy distortion. For this comparison I used the same exact speakers with the SVTs and GK.

Playing guitar through one of my 100W Marshall full stacks cranked will easily bury any of my all tubes amps played with bass...and I have several all tube amps rated for 400W. I suspect playing guitar through my Vox AC30 and pair of Celestion Blues would also bury any of my all tube bass amps. The issue here is bass requires a lot more power than guitar to have the same perceived volume.

I am pretty sure my amps with over 1KW of power and a large efficient speaker can go toe to toe with my Marshalls.

Click the thumbnail...this rig makes 1,800W. Epifani UL902C and four Genz Benz 1288T Uber Quads.

View attachment 3354185

2500W amp? What freakin cabs are you using? I'm having a hard time finding a cab that will safely handle my 1000 watter.

 

[mbell75]

2500W amp? What freakin cabs are you using

 

[ctmullins]

2500W amp? What freakin cabs are you using? I'm having a hard time finding a cab that will safely handle my 1000 watter.

Another thing that baffles me. A “1000 watt amp” only puts out 1000 watts when it’s running at the top of its capability. Turn the knobs down and it’s only putting out 500 watts, or 200 watts, or 75 watts. It’s entirely possible, and even safe if done with care and attention, to use a 200 watt cab with a 1000 watt amp.

 

[Gravel Gertie]

Another thing that baffles me. A “1000 watt amp” only puts out 1000 watts when it’s running at the top of its capability. Turn the knobs down and it’s only putting out 500 watts, or 200 watts, or 75 watts. It’s entirely possible, and even safe if done with care and attention, to use a 200 watt cab with a 1000 watt amp.

That's what I was inclined to believe too, but others on this forum have strongly disagreed.

 

[clayworx]

"Nobody ever danced to a watt."
Best comment yet.

One Watt. Mike Watt.

 

[DJCalamari]

Can I ask the question in a more practical way? Which — when played through exactly the same cab — is louder, the Bassman 500 hybrid or the Bassman 100T? I’d prefer an answer from someone who has played both, not a hypothetical.

 

[agedhorse]

This explains why pink noise is used to tune a PA system over white noise! Thanks for helping me make the connection between electrical and acoustic.

Correct

Good thing that they didn’t wait for solid state technology to improve. Nobody ever did that at any point along the technology timeline, they worthed with what th y had available. But there’s no question that those amps were part of the sound and did inspire some of what was being written. Just as it does today.

You can’t hold back rock ‘n’ roll.

One interesting point. Solid state recording, both mixing desks and tape recorders, and later DAW’s, quickly took over when they were introduced. That part of the process was generally not in the hands of the artists but they liked it. Reliability over tube based studio recording equipment was a big factor.

Mixing consoles and processing migrated quickly to solid state because the features that were needed (including lower noise floor) were impractical to design into a console because of size, weight, complexity, cost, reliability and simple limits of topology.

Another thing that baffles me. A “1000 watt amp” only puts out 1000 watts when it’s running at the top of its capability. Turn the knobs down and it’s only putting out 500 watts, or 200 watts, or 75 watts. It’s entirely possible, and even safe if done with care and attention, to use a 200 watt cab with a 1000 watt amp.

I agree, the problem is that different players have a different idea of care, attention, common sense, realistic expectations, good judgement, etc.

That's what I was inclined to believe too, but others on this forum have strongly disagreed.

Note that they have disagreed for the reasons I mentioned in the above post. Your volume needs (based on your posts) combined with not understanding the details of what we have been trying to explain make you a (more) likely candidate for an "unhappy ending".

As an example of this in a different area, many of the horses I ride are horses I would never put an average rider on. They are very athletic, quick and tend to be a little bit more "free thinking" than the average horse. I have 40 years of experience with this type of horse, I ride semi-professionally and have the skill/strength to handle whatever comes my way because I have the experience to know when things are going to go off script before it happens. An average rider doesn't have these tools and could get seriously hurt or killed riding this kind of horse.

 

[Wasnex]

A watt is a watt yes. And volume should correlate with the numbers provided the numbers are true to the meaning in the first place.

But there is a difference between "volume" and "loudness". Two 100dB signals may both register at the same volume but one might appear louder than the other depending on compression ratio and upper harmonic detail.

Correct. When an amp starts clipping it starts shifting energy higher in the frequency band. So with a clean signal more of the energy is concentrated at the fundamental, and with the distorted signal you hear more of the harmonics that are generated when distortion occurs. I believe this is why you get the perception of the low end washing out as an amp is pushed further into saturation.

Another issue that you probably haven't considered. Once the amp is pushed so hard that it starts hitting the rails, the output voltage cannot increase further. In fact as the amp produces more power, the power supply will actually sag under the load. So despite making more power, the volume can actually go down if you push the amp far enough into distortion because the peak to peak voltage is decreased. The increased wattage occurs because the wave form remains at the peaks longer, rather than because the peaks are higher.

My personal opinion is making general observations about the volume of tube VS solid-state is nonsense. I have a large collection of amps and their performance characteristics vary significantly. If you want to make a meaningful contribution, then compare two specific amps. For example compare a vintage Ampeg SVT to a series I GK RB700. I did this and found the GK played louder clean than the SVT did with heavy distortion.

The RB700 and SVT are both awesome amps that play louder than I need. I would choose one or the other depending on the tone and feel I wanted rather than volume. If I needed more volume I have plenty of much louder amps. My Mesa Titan and SVT8-Pro each capture different elements of my SVT's sound and are way louder. I also have at least four different flavors of tube amps that are louder then my SVTs.

 

[Wasnex]

2500W amp? What freakin cabs are you using? I'm having a hard time finding a cab that will safely handle my 1000 watter.

I didn't say I am using all of the 2,500W. The amp is an SVT8-Pro. I have two types of cabs with Electro Voice EVM 18Bs, a Greenboy Dually loaded with Faital 15PR400s, and four Genz Benz 1288t Uber Quads.

I gigged professionally for a very long time with about 250W and a single 210 cab, so I am not about bone crushing volume. In fact my goal is to get people to ask me to turn up.

 

[Coolhandjjl]

Can I ask the question in a more practical way? Which — when played through exactly the same cab — is louder, the Bassman 500 hybrid or the Bassman 100T? I’d prefer an answer from someone who has played both, not a hypothetical.

That would be a great test!

 

[Eminor3rd]

Is there a difference in how loud a tube watt is vs a solid state watt?

Or....

Why is it a guitar player can bring a 30 watt single 12 combo up on stage, barely turn up the volume and be loud as heck vs a bass rig?

I guess what I'm asking is what is going on between not only tube vs solid state, but even more so between guitar vs bass heads as far as loudness?

Why does a bass player need a 300 watt head when a guitar player can get by with only a 100 watt head? Does the frequency spectrum the instruments cover have a hand in this?

The bolded in your OP covers the bulk of it.

 

[beans-on-toast]

Mixing consoles and processing migrated quickly to solid state because the features that were needed (including lower noise floor) were impractical to design into a console because of size, weight, complexity, cost, reliability and simple limits of topology.

.

Most of the people that designed transistorized studio equipment and audio transformers at the time knew what they were doing. This was a big factor in hastening the transition.

Tube equipment went into dumpsters. Some time later, many realized that they were a bit hasty with outboard equipment. Tube based mics are still in production although solid state of the art mics today sound very, very good. [As an aside, Lewitt mics are one of the best performance and cost values out there for studio mics. LEWITT – Austrian Microphone Excellence]

Studio equipment was unlike some of the transistorized musical instrument amps at the time which people soon realized had design issues.

I think that Woodstock was a turning point. Large venues were in the future and the stacks of McIntosh hi-fi tube amps like they used at Woodstock weren’t the best way to go. The appliction demanded reliable high powered solid state amps.

 

[mbell75]

Another thing that baffles me. A “1000 watt amp” only puts out 1000 watts when it’s running at the top of its capability. Turn the knobs down and it’s only putting out 500 watts, or 200 watts, or 75 watts. It’s entirely possible, and even safe if done with care and attention, to use a 200 watt cab with a 1000 watt amp.

This is incorrect. Unless your amp has some kind of attenuator on it or a way to select between number of tubes in use ( or like a Katana with 3 different power settings) its always running at full power no matter what the dial on the volume is. A 100 watt Marshall head is still running at 100 watts with the volume at 1, it doesn't drop to 10 watts lol.