Tube amps from eBay (China)

[arvin]

Theres lots of tube amps from China on ebay, that are very cheap
How good are they?
Anyone had any experience in this fiel?.I welcome advice as I would like to buy an Aria Music Angel from china.

Thanks

Arvin

[ethermion]

Search this forum for "yushang". That will give you one persons experience with design, quality and customer support.

You still get what you pay for. The last thing I want in my living room is a high voltage tube amp I cannot trust.

[uvodee]

Is that the type and brand name?
do you have the name of their website please?



Jean-Pierre

[arvin]

what about this website? http://stores.ebay.co.uk/Feedback-UpUpUp-99p-WinWinWin

Theses are the ones I was referring to.

Thanks btw

if you know of any good valve amp suppliers let me know please but I am not rich!

[lt cdr data]

hi I am afraid most chinese amps are poor,

1/ they have poor mains transformers, which are wound for 220 volts, and

2/ they have mostly poor output transformers that usually are small cored, lacking in henries for low bass, and sometimes an improper impedance ratio.

3. frequently, the capacitors and diodes in the psu are on limit and have a very short and eventful life.

4/ finally, some even have no safety earth, which in the Uk is a no no, if the case becomes live that's 450 volts. More advanced countries take safety very seriously, and rightly so.

Perhaps these chinese companies actually want to kill their customers.

5, also, they have manuals not written for westerners really, no information on servicing, biasing, all these may be wrong, 220 volts on your primary will give more volts on your tubes, perhaps stressing, shortening life, and even catastrophic failurers, however due to the probably low bias, this may be unlikely power wise.

They are flooding the market, I don't know how long they will last, they seem to think there is a lot of demand and cash to be made.

no doubt, some will go bust, a few will continue.

You have been warned, some are quite good tho'. Consonance, yarland and meixing are among the better ones.

You can get a good idea with both transistor and tube amps by the weight of the thing, more is always better.

As an aside, the dynavox vr 70, aka audio institute is unbeatable for uk £250 or so. Its well designed and doens't really have many bad points above.

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Roehrenverstae...QQcmdZViewItem

as an aside, I know lim the seller below, personally, he will look after you and takes safety VERY seriously.

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Audio-Institut...QQcmdZViewItem


check here also..

http://www.apah69.dsl.pipex.com/dynavox/dynavox.htm


you can even buy 2, bridge it by paralleling the inputs and outputs, and have 80 watts of valves for £500. plentiful and cheap, too.

[arvin]

Thanks a lot mate, I have seen these before, I will go for one now!

You have been a great help!

All the best Arvin

[Arius]

what about this website? http://stores.ebay.co.uk/Feedback-UpUpUp-99p-WinWinWin

With reference to the criticims leveraged against "Made in China" amps, I can only speak for the Music Angel EL34 Integrated Amp that I bought from the store above.

I, for one, am no fan of poor quality cheap labor crap but that amp I bought (which was intended for experimentation) definitely did not have any of the flaws mentioned in this thread. I requested for, and obtained a copy of the schematic (rather promptly). It is a hefy unit (heavier than a comparable ASL EL34) with good parts and build quality. I gotta admit I was surprised. The only snag is the poorly written manual but with some tech know-how and schematic at hand, my needs are covered.

So fortunately (or unfortunately for some), the Chinese are catching up. Do note that this particular eBay seller has detailed pictures of his products.

[woodturner-fran]

I bought a little valve headphone amp from China. Its called a Little Dot 2 and are always on ebay at USD95 plus USD45 shipping. It does use oddball tubes that you can really only get from the seller, but they're very cheap. Its not the best made amp in the world, but it has incredible sound........ just glorious. Just can't be beat for value and would hold its own against many higher priced amps.

I would not hesitate to deal chinese again, however, what you should do is contact some of the buyers on ebay who have bought the amp your interested in (check through his feedback) and ask them how they got on.....

Most sellers are reputable, but you don't want to meet the exception.


Fran

[phn]

Where do you think the new Dynavox VR 70s are made?

Could it be China?

[aaudioman]

I bought Icon audios LA-4 triode vacuum tube preamplifier ,with
all point to point Pure silver wire , heavy vishay 2 watt resisters,
Rubicon, and Solen capacitors,3 potted fine grain Japanese
transformers,Ceramic sockets ,even a remote with a automatic lower volume feature on it's own seperate board. And excellent sounding as in Julys Hifi news magazine stated with low distortion rating that were excellent by any standards. ,
a Superb special offer as a option with the superb very expensive Jensen copper coupling capacitors ,and 1950s NOS tubes for under
£1000 delivered . I can tell you this I have several freinds ,one with a AR 25 ,and sp16, and a Naim, mine is much more musical with superb soundstaging and punch and cool looking .I think it is still on special at hifidelityaudio.