The verdict is in - VFET amplifiers are terrible

I slept bad because I was up all night redesigning my horn speakers. My V-Fet inspired me to improve upon a few things. First I bought some luxury XO caps, and now I am redesigning my whole speaker, finally adding that last channel. Maybe I should have done that in different order.

I totally get it. Once I redesigned my entire hi-fi system because I bought a new album and the system wouldn't reproduce it.

So, whatever you do, don't buy Jane Siberry's "Maria" album, mmm'kay?
 
As my moniker suggests, here are some of my sonic SIT treasures. 🙂
 

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OK, last night I made a disturbing discovery. It started when I listened to a CD of Dame Nellie Melba recordings from the 1920's and earlier. This stuff is so old it came off wax cylinders. Now, it was scratchy obviously, but it sounded far more "correct" than anything modern that I've heard recently. So tonight I extended the experiment further.

I dug out some Billboard compilation CDs of 1950's music, the stuff that was recorded before we had all this multitrack horse puckey. It actually sounds like real music! In those days the musicians had to be good enough performers to get together in a tiny studio and put their songs down in a single take. No tricks, no effects, and good engineering and miking practices were the order of the day.

I challenge you to find a copy of Chuck Berry's "Maybelline" or Fats Domino's "Ain't That A Shame" or almost anything recorded before 1965 and listen to it on a VFET amplifier. I know these songs from my childhood, and only ever heard them on SE valve amplifiers.

I'm utterly shocked at how good this music is.
 
My recent acquisition.

Nice. When I bought a house in New Zealand about eight years ago it came with a beautiful old wind-up gramophone, although the arm needed some parts. I sold the place three years ago and that went with the sale, as did my unique single-seater homebuilt airplane.

I used to play with 78 rpm records as a kid, but even then we regarded them as a bit old fashioned due to the surface noise. Thankfully many of the important works have been re-released as CD compilations, and often at bargain bin prices. Will now be scouring the 'net for old blues and jazz recordings.
 
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For those who enjoy orchestration, I can also recommend old movie soundtrack albums. Like those from the 1930's - Lost Horizons and Captain Blood era. Very lifelike recordings. Must be those obsolete tube things they used. 🙂