I believe...in tube amps now. (1 Viewer)

[Saurav]

Just another example of YMMV.

Very true. What's your opinion of SACD? The short demos I've heard came really close to vinyl, IMO. I have no idea what the software availability situation is like though.

 

[Frank_S]

This may be a bit of topic but I thought the mention of "dynamic range" in the quote below may be of interest to a few of you guys.
This quote is taken from a thread I was responding to in another forum. You may recognize the name of the person who wrote this response.

CDs are "theoretically" better, but for many reasons aren't in practice. I interviewed George Martin and when I told him that I thought my 1965 UK pressing of "Rubber Soul" sounded better than the CD issue he mastered he responded "I shouldn't be surprised at all." There are many recording engineers who work with digital all day who prefer listening to records, and they are hardly ignorant. Paul Simon's engineer Roy Halee only listens to vinyl. He thinks his recordings sound much more like the master tape on vinyl than on CD. I could drop a dozen more famous names but then I'd be a name dropper. In fact Steve probably thought I was when I dropped the first one! I have a paper here by an IEEE engineer that "proves" that vinyl has wider dynamic range than CD....to get to that result requires looking at the picture somewhat differently, but that's how Einstein came up with his theory. Listening to records and CDs, I usually find the LPs have wider dynamics but didn't know why that should be. Reading that paper explained what I've always observed. As for frequency response, CDs are chopped off on top....while we can't hear much above 16 or 18k we do respond to overtones we can't hear. That's why the President of Sony, a violinist, admitted that vinyl reproduces the overtones of the violin CDs cannot. Now with SACD, we have a digital format that really sounds great and can reproduce the overtones....

Michael Fremer
senior contributing editor, Stereophile

 

[Larry B]

Saurav:

Very true. What's your opinion of SACD?

I have not heard a great deal of SACD but what I heard was not equal to my own CD playback. I know that's hard for most people to accept, but there are certainly others who agree.
Having said that, I should point out that SACD is inherently superior to Redbook, and I don't doubt that the truly top-end SACD players (e.g., Accuphase) will surpass my CD player. But the SONY players do not.
Regards,
Larry

 

[Alex F.]

Arthur:

So tell me, how much time have you personally spent critically listening to first-class tube components and turntables/cartridges? Or are you making statements based on hearsay and what you've read?

It would be interesting to know which specific products displeased you.

 

[Saurav]

Uh oh, someone actually proved that vinyl measures better than CD in some parameter? A relatively important parameter like dynamic range, nonetheless? Run for the hills
Jokes apart - yes, that is certainly interesting, because the engineer in me always wants to find out why I like what I like. I'm glad that I can suppress that side of me a little though, otherwise I would find myself only listening to what I was supposed to like, or what was logically supposed to sound good. But at the end of the day, even if it doesn't make any sense at all, it doesn't really bother me.
On a similar note - I've read an account of someone who compared the dynamic range of the CD and the LP across various albums. He found that CDs were consistently recorded with less dynamic range. So, even though the medium has the capacity for more (assuming we follow conventional knowledge here), much of the recorded music does not use that capacity. So... that pretty much brings you back to square one, IMO.

 

[Saurav]

I have not heard a great deal of SACD but what I heard was no equal to my own CD playback.

Yes, that is certainly a pretty strong statement

 

[John Tompkins]

Ok, I got my project 1.2 tt, sumiko phono box and grado red cartridge this weekend hooked up to my bottlehead (keep in mind that I am a total vinyl newbie).I listened to 6 or so albums (boston, christofer cross, bon jovi, doobie bros, elo and heart)..I cleaned them with spin clean and applied gruv glide and they appeared to be in good shape.

The verdict is mixed. First off it IS different then cds and it seemed more toe-tapping plus voices/guitars sounded more natural to me. Also I could totally crank it up very loud with no hint of harshness(VERY nice sounding). The bad news was two albums had pops/hiss so bad I couldnt listen to them and even the good ones had a few pops. The sound was a bit more compressed and the bass wasnt as hard hitting as my cds. Overall I am very pleased and want to get some mint albums to listen to (what albums are considered reference ??)..I wont be throwing away my cds but albums can sound more to MY liking then cds.

One last question, I have to crank my bottlehead(sumiko phono) to almost full throttle to get the loudness I want..Is this a problem ?? thanks

 

[Saurav]

One last question, I have to crank my bottlehead(sumiko phono) to almost full throttle to get the loudness I want..Is this a problem ?? thanks

What's the gain on your phono stage? It shouldn't be a problem with the Foreplay, I had to do something similar with my last phono stage which had only 34dB of gain.

 

[Rich H]

Folks, here's a suggestion:
I see many people here wondering how to integrate tubes into their home theater. I've been on the same quest, as I prefer tube amplification (use it in my music rig).
My Home Theater has to integrate into a domestic setting, something the wife and kids can turn on/off easily.
Here is one solution I will probably go with: the SCE Harmonic Recover System. Basically it's an active black box that is supposed to go between preamp and power amp.
You can read about it from a "SoundStage" review at this link:
http://mma.tv/TUF/DisplayMessages.cf...92&P=204&FID=1
I have one, and while I don't particularly buy the claims of the company, mine HRS does do some interesting things for my system. It basically adds a very tube-like sound - fuller, warmer, slightly more spacious, more relaxed - transients are less hard and aggressive. It's amazing how inserting this device into a solid state system mimics the sound I get with my Conrad Johnson tube amps.
I haven't received my AV receiver yet. But I did use the HRS between the audio outputs of my DVD player and a two-channel solid state amp, and it really did a lot of what I'd get from tubes. In particular, it made dialog sound fuller and more natural. As well, it took the irritating hard edge, or "bite" out the sound.
Of course you'd need to buy two units to get four channels worth of HRS "tube-like" sound. But it still might be a cheaper, more user-friendly route to go than buying tube amps.
For what it's worth.
Rich H.

 

[Larry B]

Saurav:

Yes, that is certainly a pretty strong statement

It is if you think that the encoding is all that counts. But it ceases to be so difficult to conceive when you conside that (1) my DACS are almost certainly better than those in the SONY SACD player, and (2) the SONY analogue stages can't hold a candle to the ones I use.

Of course, since the proof is in the listening, I wish you were closer so you could come over and hear for yourself what I am talking about. (I would borrow an SACD player for the occassion.)

Larry

 

[Saurav]

No, I'm not saying I don't believe you. I can just see many people spluttering at the mere suggestion though

 

[GordonL]

Another company that makes products that add even-order harmonics to SS devices is the Audio Harmony TWO (2 channel) & SIX (6 channel). Link Removed
Reviews can be found at http://www.stereotimes.com/index.shtm

 

[Larry B]

Saurav:

I can just see many people spluttering at the mere suggestion though

Their problem, not mine.

Larry

 

[Saurav]

True.

 

[Robert Elliott]

Of course, many splutter at the mere suggestion tube amps sound better than SS amps.
My workmates thought I lost my mind when I told them I bought a vintage tube amp. Tubes?! Are you crazy?! That's old technology, they wailed.
They now wait for me to bring the amp and speakers into work so they can hear it because they simply do not believe it is possible for a tube amp to sound good.
I will mention I just bought a bunch of tubes - NOS Mullards, some new Ei, and some "used, test new" Mullards. Jesus Christ. The tubes cost far more than I paid for the amplifier. Figure I need to go drop a grand on a new tube amp so the relative costs take on a more appropriate (in my mind) ratio.
I am hitting swap meets from now on. Maybe I will luck into some NOS tubes and can recover my money on Ebay. In fact, I found some tubes which I can purchase for $75/each and just saw them sell on Ebay for over $235/each. Some people have more money than sense. Oops. Maybe I now need to include myself in that statement.

 

[Saurav]

Of course, many splutter at the mere suggestion tube amps sound better than SS amps.

Good point. It's interesting how many people I've seen get defensive and go "no way, not possible, I'll prove it to you" and so on. Makes me wonder if this somehow makes them feel threatened. Or their ideas, or the world they've constructed around those ideas. Who knows... I have no judgements to make, because I haven't come to any conclusions, for now these are just observations.

 

[Amir]

I was about to upgrade my pre/pro to another SS system but thanks to John I am thinking of giving the tubes a try. Does anyone have any inexperience with the Anthem Pre 2L? It has remote operation that can help better integrate it in the system. How does it compare with the Bottlehead? I know the price even used ($500-600) is a lot more than bottlehead but the convenience might be worth it if the sound quality is good. I would appreciate any advice.
Regards

Amir

 

[Dan Marchewka]

I know what you mean about upgrading your SS pre/pro. I am still going to buy the Outlaw 950 when my name comes up on the list for my home theater needs, but I figured what the hell and see how good a tube pre-amp might sound for CD's. It arrives tomorrow. I bought a Transcendent Sound pre-build kit off of Audiogon. I looked at the Bottleneck (Bottlehead, sorry--always do that!), but I liked the looks of the Trancendent Sound Grounded Grid as it fits in with all my other equipment--no tubes showing. One thing I wish it had was remote operation, but I have read on their site that you can incorporate a motorized volume control unit into this pre-amp. Other than that, many people have built this pre-amp from scratch and it is highly flexible with adding inputs and a phono stage and the like. Might give you another option. I will post my opinions on it after I get a chance to listen to it for a little bit.

 

[Saurav]

Bottleneck It's Bottlehead.
I'm interested in your opinion of the GG. People have compared that to the Bottlehead Foreplay, and the opinions seem to be fairly evenly divided. I believe the GG is a pretty good preamp.

 

[Dan Marchewka]

I received my Grounded Grid pre-amp today. If anybody is interested in it, the website is transcendentsound.com. All I can say is it exceeded all my expectations. The soundstage is huge while all the voices and instruments are very clear and defined. It added much refinement to the sound. Even my girlfriend was amazed at the difference. I am using a Citation 7.1 amp, which I thought sounded very sterile using my Denon 3802, but shines with the Grounded Grid pre-amp. I am also using Swan Diva 6.1's and a Panasonic DVD-H1000 for my CD player.