yep that's for sure.
Late Darrell from Pantera used Randall SS in the early days then switched to all valve Krank amps. They sounded awesome.
Smooth distortion.😉
I learn something new everyday. I know many bands have SS phases, but they usually get well again🙂 I saw InFlames this Summer and it was all tube. Marshall I think, but cannot remember for sure.
Indeed there are more often than not a SS pedal in the chain.
I'm not going to elaborate my claim regarding musicality of tubes and SS now, I'm typing on an iphone.
The compression is a given, and following that we get the rich/harmonic distortion. Tubes also dont store a charge like SS when overdriven, giving nice recovery. The list goes on but not on this keyboard.
But is well known and regarded as true.
Actually that's not the whole story: directly-heated triodes have the potential to be more linear as a transconductance device than any transistor, and this is why they are often used without any loop negative feedback. Of course the latter brings certain drawbacks, such as highish output impedance, but this is only a significant problem in power amplifier output stages.
Here is a nice discussion of device-level distortion and feedback:
http://www.nutshellhifi.com/library/FindingCG.html
Many designers use DHTs exactly because they have intrinsically low distortion. Distortion in valve circuits is in general a function of many things, including the choice of operating point and circuit topology.
Alex
Then again, guys like, for example, Les Paul, Steve Howe (of Yes), Bob Weir (of Grateful Dead), Alex Skolnick (of Testament), Steve Lukather, and West Montgomery switched from using tube amps to using solid-state amps - and naturally kept sounding as awesome as earlier. 😀
Guess they have or had their own opinion about the musicality of different things.
It doesn't really make much sense to compare tubes and transistors on a device level. Transistors as is may be more non-linear, but stick them to an actual well-designed circuit and it's pretty impossible to make a tube circuit that could compare. As far as I know, precision measurement electronics today are pretty much based on solid-state technology - not on tubes. Maybe there's a reason... like that those supposedly very linear triodes have suspiciously curvy graphs to illustatre their operating characteristics.
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As a general rule, triodes are not linear as a transconductance device (an ideal triode follows a 3/2 law). Whether they are directly-heated or indirectly-heated is irrelevant. However, triodes can be linear as a voltage amplification device if they have a high impedance load. As a general rule, low mu triodes are better in this respect than high mu triodes because the grid is further from the cathode and so there is less island effect. So my view is that it is not the DHT-ness of early triodes which matters, but their low mu (and the fact that they usually have circular anodes - the same shape as the grid).
Transistors, on the other hand, can have almost perfect exponential transconductance response which may be exactly what you want in instrumentation but a nuisance for audio. At least you can, in principle, estimate exactly how non-linear they will be! For example, the 2nd order harmonic distortion of a BJT in % is equal to the peak base-emitter signal in mV.
Transistors, on the other hand, can have almost perfect exponential transconductance response which may be exactly what you want in instrumentation but a nuisance for audio. At least you can, in principle, estimate exactly how non-linear they will be! For example, the 2nd order harmonic distortion of a BJT in % is equal to the peak base-emitter signal in mV.
I love these forum arguments. It is like arguing about wine. There is good wine and crap wine, but two well crafted wines of different grapes will both be quite good and may be just what you want for a specific accompaniment. But they are different. And good. And used well in different applications. And may suit different fancies differently.
Depending on which accuracy one is after, measurable accuracy or audible accuracy? SET amp offering more of even order harmonics is interpreted by listeners as more natural sounding (what live sound would be like) despite its higher amount of scope measurable distortion. P-P amp offering more of odd harmonic distortion is interpreted by listeners as stale or harsh sounding despite its low amount of scope measurable distortion. The choice is up to what one prefers. It is a listening hobby after all so I choose how accurate the equipment sounds to me.
Rich odd order harmonics are nothing to be praised about. Some P-P tube amps have rolled off high frequency which gives that "warm" sound but it can be achieved with SS amp too, just use a tone control.
I understand your analogy but I don't actually agree that tubes and solid-sate are all that different: Both can be designed to provide an outstanding linearity and low distortion. Likewise, both can also be designed to distort with some subjectively preferable manner.
In the end, most of those supposed "differences" merely originate from the conscious decisions that designers made to employ those technologies in usually different kinds of applications, for different kinds of purposes and to achieve different kinds of goals.
Does it help the analogy if I take it farther (guilty of flogging it for the fun of it)?
If you distill the wine and remove everything but the pure ETOH, all wines will be pretty much the same too. It is the messy stuff that gives it character.
But live sound has no distortion, by definition, neither by ear nor scope. You seem to have redefined 'accurate' to mean 'pleasant' or 'preferred'. By all means listen to the sound you prefer, but don't pretend it is necessarily accurate. This is the canonical audiophile self-delusion - I prefer it, therefore it must be better. It is just as daft as the objectivists self-delusion - it measures better, therefore it must be better.
A lot of these arguments could disappear if only we could all agree on three statements:
1. There is at best only a limited correlation between current measurements and perceived sound quality. This may be because people measure the wrong things, or it may be because people actually prefer distorted sound. I think the truth is a combination of the two.
2. Some people prefer distorted sound - both non-linear distortion and non-flat frequency response. This was established back in the 1950s, but is still widely denied. A little low-order distortion and a gentle HF rolloff sound richer and warmer - less accurate but many people prefer it.
3. The placebo effect is far stronger than people realise, even among those who are aware of it.
If we could agree, then there is a chance that audio could make real progress or, perhaps, we could agree that further progress is not necessary and concentrate on opposing backward steps such as DAB radio.
Just for interest if you play any instrument in different places the sound will be "distorted by resonance of the area". So live sound is distorted! So to reproduce "real sound" it has to contain the distortion of the area it was recorded in without distortion if you get my meaning!
Just for fun!🙂
Regards
M. Gregg.
I thought all musical notes carried harmonics. In a sense distortion.
But agreed, ideally there would be no additional distortion to the music as heard in the sweet spot of the venue in which it was performed.
Unfortunately, since distortion and loss are introduced as soon as it hits the microphone, not to mention the rest of the recording to playback processes, this is impossible.
Given that it is impossible, and that I could probably only begin to touch meaningful steps for perfect reproduction with crazy investment, primarily into my listening space acoustics, I may as well shoot for the sound that pleases me the most.
Life is full of compromises....may as well enjoy them.
But agreed, ideally there would be no additional distortion to the music as heard in the sweet spot of the venue in which it was performed.
Unfortunately, since distortion and loss are introduced as soon as it hits the microphone, not to mention the rest of the recording to playback processes, this is impossible.
Given that it is impossible, and that I could probably only begin to touch meaningful steps for perfect reproduction with crazy investment, primarily into my listening space acoustics, I may as well shoot for the sound that pleases me the most.
Life is full of compromises....may as well enjoy them.
And the microphones will have picked that up-it is often easy to guess which famous hall or recording studio was used if the reproduction is accurate
I'm with Wavebourn on this one.. I originally switched to tubes because my sense was that in the hifi arena they preserve a greater sense of the dynamics of the original recording, and their inherently good linearity lends itself to simple circuit topologies that generally do much less damage to the sound overall than the blameless solid state counterparts that measure so much better than they sometimes end up sounding.
There are applications where tubes are employed in a deliberate way to generate distortion, but this is by no means inherent to the technology as there are devices like the 6SN7, D3A, C3G, and 5842 just to name a few which are ridiculously linear even by solid state standards. (SY can corroborate in the case of the D3A and possibly some of the others listed.)
The closest I have heard to "Live sound" if there is such a thing was:
Magneplanars, Krell, Counterpont, Rel.
The music was a "live recording". I could hear the dirt under foot of the performers. The room seemed to become the large hall. If I closed my eyes and listened, when I opened them I was shocked to find myself in a small room.
Interesting that I still prefer the sound of tube reproduction at home!
Regards
M. Gregg
Magneplanars, Krell, Counterpont, Rel.
The music was a "live recording". I could hear the dirt under foot of the performers. The room seemed to become the large hall. If I closed my eyes and listened, when I opened them I was shocked to find myself in a small room.
Interesting that I still prefer the sound of tube reproduction at home!
Regards
M. Gregg
That same experience could be repeated with tube equiptment and suitable loudspeakers. The set up you have described is extremely high cost.
I think this is the reason I DIY with tubes. I could not justify owning the system. However we can modify to create a system that "moves us emotionally".
If we build a system and we enjoy it (even if it has LED's under the tubes) then it has been worth while!
Regards
M. Gregg
If we build a system and we enjoy it (even if it has LED's under the tubes) then it has been worth while!
Regards
M. Gregg
It is also interesting and I think highly apposite that you mention a live recording. I too have often noticed that live recordings sometimes sound much better than you would expect from the inevitable likely compromises. I guess that they are often issued without so much processing, warts and all.
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