Re: Re: Tubes in Pre-amps: your expertise and honest opinion.

[Douglas Baldwin <coyotelk@optonline.net>]

Nik wrote (re SS amps that respond like tubes/valves):


> There are none in production that I know of. There's no point. It's like
puting a hotel in the middle of the Sahara: everyone assumes it's a mirage
(joke).

Not true, in my experience. I review amps professionally, and I try about
four new solid state amps every year, including some moderately pricey ones
that take their marketing seriously. If it was *possible* to make a SS amp
with tube-like qualities *at almost any price point* I believe it would be
done.

> Thje Bluetone gets there in a guitar amp.

I tried accessing the web site - couldn't get on it.

> And back in the 80s there was an overdrive pedal that fooled 100% in 
>blind
tests. But it's been off the market for many years.

What pedal would that be? Who did the test?

> There are simple circuit techniques around to reproduce all the desirable
characteristics of valve amps, but peole still won't buy the stuff.

There are still lots of SS amps being sold, and some are very highly
regarded. Yamaha makes one (can't remember the model offhand), Roland's 
Jazz
Chorus 120 has surely proven the test of time, Marshall's Mode Four is 
quite
amazing, jazz players love the Polytone Brutes, and the Vox Valvetronix
modeling amps are very, very good. But none of these respond like a tube
amp. They are great for other things: loud, clean tone, especially; light
weight; and approximations of a wide range of tube amp tones. But they are
not tube amps. I've played them all, side by side with my tube amps. I like
them, sometimes, for certain jobs.
>
> Ironic, when so much effort goes into making modern valve amps sound like
SS.

I don't know of anyone who is trying to make a valve/tube amp sound like a
SS amp. Can you give me some names? Again, to quote my earlier post: 
Please,
please, please (to quote the late great Godfather of Soul) tell me where I
will find a SS power amp of any wattage that will respond like the power
sections in [my favorite tube amps], or where there is a SS preamp that 
will
massage my tone like any of these?

 I play without blindfolds, but with an open mind, open ears, and open
heart.

Douglas Baldwin, coyote-at-large
www.thecoyote.org
coyotelk@optonline.net

"Life! Life!
Clouds and clowns!
You don't have to come down!"
- Sly and the Family Stone