Tube Power Amp Reviews

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Tube Power Amp Reviews
Lamm Industries ML1 monoblock power amplifier
Jonathan Scull  |  May 20, 2000  | 
The last Lamm product I had my hands on was a pair of M1.1 monoblocks (see Vol.18 No.4, Vol.22 No.7). I liked those hybrid tube/solid-state amps quite a lot.
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Tube Power Amp Reviews
McIntosh Labs MC2000 power amplifier
Jonathan Scull  |  Mar 29, 2000  | 
I wasn't raised a McIntosh lad. My dad used Fisher, Bogen, Leak, and Ampex tubed electronics—and, at one time, even home-built speakers—to keep the house filled with a steady, enriching flow of Mozart. He never owned a Mac component, and, when going upmarket, reached for B&O, alas. So while I knew that many audiophiles hold tubed McIntosh gear—especially the early designs—in very high regard, I was somehow never bitten or smitten. But let's face it—for lo these many years, McIntosh has been for many the name in quality American audio. Take my friend Dan, to whom I've referred several times in the pages of Stereophile. He runs a tubed Conrad-Johnson 9 preamplifier, but wouldn't dream of giving up his 270Wpc solid-state McIntosh MC7270. He's goldurn proud of it!
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Tube Power Amp Reviews
Nagra VPA monoblock power amplifier
Jonathan Scull  |  Apr 08, 1999  | 
Nagra's VPA amplification system consists of two slim, handsome monoblock amplifiers intended for vertical placement. They look good adjacent to the speakers. However, two 845 tubes put out a lot of heat, so the amplifier should be at least a foot away from your speakers...unless you're looking for a nice crackle finish.
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Tube Power Amp Reviews
VTL ST-85 power amplifier
Lonnie Brownell  |  Feb 26, 1999  | 
"More power!!!"
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Tube Power Amp Reviews
Conrad-Johnson Premier Twelve monoblock amplifier
Michael Fremer  |  Feb 01, 1999  | 
Conrad-Johnson is one of audio's "marquee" companies, and charges accordingly. The Premier Twelve tube monoblock power amplifier, rated at 140W, sells for a rather steep $3495 each, meaning that unless you listen in mono, be prepared to lay out almost $7000 just for the amplification link in your audio chain. Apparently, many audiophiles feel the money is well spent: according to Conrad-Johnson, the Twelve has been a consistently strong seller during its approximately five-year production history.
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Tube Power Amp Reviews
VTL MB750 monoblock power amplifier
Brian Damkroger  |  Dec 03, 1997  | 
How much power do you really need? What does it do for you, anyway? Even before the single-ended renaissance, the prevailing wisdom was that you really didn't need that much power. When I had a pair of Met 7 speakers, even the "1 watt" indicator LED was hardly ever lit. Ditto for my time with a Threshold Stasis Two—all those cool power-indicator LEDs just sat there dark. Besides, everyone knows that power can be had only at tremendous cost, both monetary and in terms of other performance attributes.
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Tube Power Amp Reviews
VAC PA80/80 power amplifier
Wes Phillips  |  Mar 03, 1996  | 
I love the sound of glowing glass,
especially when I'm lonely.
I love the nuances of emotion.
It's nothing new, nothing new,
The sound of glowing glass... (with apologies to Nick Lowe)
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Tube Power Amp ReviewsJ. Gordon Holt
Audio Research M300 monoblock power amplifier
Martin Colloms, J. Gordon Holt  |  Dec 26, 1995  |  First Published: Dec 26, 1987  | 
JGH opens
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Tube Power Amp ReviewsTube Preamp Reviews
Balanced Audio Technology VK-5 preamplifier & VK-60/75 power amplifiers
Robert Deutsch  |  Dec 02, 1995  | 
How important is the use of balanced circuit typology in the design of preamplifiers and power amplifiers? Ask the top audio designers (I didn't, but just play along, okay?) and you'll get a wide variety of opinions. Some reject the balanced approach outright, arguing that it represents a needless duplication of circuit components, and that better results can be achieved if the same attention and resources are devoted to perfecting a single-ended circuit. In his provocatively titled article "Balance: Benefit or Bluff?" (Stereophile, November 1994, p.77), Martin Colloms questioned the advantages of balanced designs, suggesting that while the results may be better in certain respects (eg, noise level), the reproduced sound may suffer in other, perhaps more important ways (eg, rhythm and dynamics).
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Tube Power Amp ReviewsJ. Gordon Holt
VTL MB300 & MB450 Signature monoblock amplifiers
J. Gordon Holt, Various  |  Oct 20, 1995  |  First Published: Oct 20, 1988  | 
Not only does the venerable vacuum tube refuse to lie down and die, as everyone predicted when audio went solid-state; it continues to deliver better performance than anyone had imagined it could. Only a few years ago, we could characterize "the tube sound" as being sweet but soft at the high end, rich but loose in the midbass, deficient in deep bass, and bright and forward, usually with excellent reproduction of depth. Since then, we've seen the introduction of what might almost be called a new generation of tube amplifiers, which rival solid-state units in those areas where tubes used to have weaknesses, but have given up little of the tube's sonic strengths.
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Tube Power Amp Reviews
Conrad-Johnson Premier Eleven power amplifier
Wes Phillips  |  Oct 02, 1995  |  First Published: Oct 02, 1994  | 
I love being seduced. I'm shocked to learn that not everyone does. The very qualities in live music that excite and intoxicate me are denigrated by many audiophiles as "colorations." It would seem they prefer the lean, chilly sound that they've dubbed "accurate." While I concede that almost all of their preferred audio components have ever-more-extended high frequencies, I'm not certain that that's the same thing as having greater accuracy. It sounds to me—to use Stravinsky's description of electronic music—"spayed for overtone removal." The overtones that I miss are those stripped from the middle ranges—the ones the clinical crowd (footnote 1) disparagingly refers to as the "warmth" region.
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Tube Power Amp Reviews
Audio Research Classic 60 power amplifier
John Atkinson  |  Sep 26, 1995  |  First Published: Sep 26, 1990  | 
"The only tubes that I want to see in my household are...the picture tube in my TV and the magnetron in the microwave oven," a Glendale, CA, reader recently wrote, and I guess his feelings reflect those of many when confronted by a supposedly "obsolete" audio technology. Forty years after the invention of the transistor and 20 after the widespread introduction of solid-state amplifiers (footnote 1), it must come as a shock to readers of the mass-market "slicks" that not only do a number of American manufacturers manufacture amplifiers and preamplifiers using tubes, but some of those companies—Counterpoint and Audio Research in particular—are among the more successful. It is the Classic 60 power amplifier from Minnesota-based Audio Research that is the subject of this month's lead-off equipment review.
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Tube Power Amp Reviews
Berning EA-2101 power amplifier
Dick Olsher  |  Sep 06, 1995  |  First Published: Sep 06, 1992  | 
It was back in the mid-'70s that David Berning made a name for himself in the Baltimore-Washington area as an avant-garde designer—someone with a truckload of fresh ideas about tubes. At the time, though Audio Research was starting to crank out pretty decent amplifiers, tube design was pretty much reduced to a rehash of the Williamson circuit and the Dynaco mod of the month.
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Tube Power Amp ReviewsJ. Gordon Holt
Audio Research D-250 II Servo power amplifier
J. Gordon Holt  |  Aug 16, 1995  |  First Published: Aug 16, 1986  | 
The D-250 is the flagship of Audio Research's power amplifier range and, at 250 watts per channel, is the most powerful all-tube stereo amplifier currently available in the US. Under the circumstances, then, it is not surprising that it should also be one of the heaviest and largest.
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Tube Power Amp Reviews
Cary Audio Design CAD-805 monoblock power amplifier
Dick Olsher, Various  |  Jan 29, 1995  |  First Published: Jan 29, 1994  | 
Lee de Forest filed for a US patent on his "Audion"—the first triode—on October 25, 1906, but never could explain why it worked (footnote 1). It was up to Armstrong and Langmuir, in their pioneering work, to place the hard-vacuum triode on firm scientific ground. When the US entered World War I in April 1917, the Army had to rely on French tubes. Six months later, Western Electric was mass-producing the VT-1 receiving tube and the VT-2 transmitting tube. However, it was only in the decade following World War I, as designers became conversant with the triode amplifier, that many of the crucial elements of tube amplification were nailed down. Technical issues such as coupling two gain stages and selection of optimal coupling impedance were already resolved by the mid-1920s. The triode ruled supreme until the tetrode came along in 1926, followed in 1929 by the pentode from Philips's research laboratories in Holland.
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