the search for a tube preamp

[Mr. Widget]

I do want to listen to vinyl, so the preamp must have that capability. Having said that, my vinyl collection is 30-40 years old, has been listened to a lot and is not necessarily in the best shape. Neither are my ears....many hours of playing electric guitars in bands playing louder than we should have. The turntable I will be using is not superb in any way, nor am I planning on using any exotic cartridge...a plain vanilla MM(?) like the 20 some year old Grado3 in my Denon turntable would be fine....assuming the Grado3 is a MM cartridge, I can't even say I know or would recognize the difference between MM and MC. Cost is certainly an issue, which is why I'm wandering down from Marantz 7c territory.

If you can't afford a better tube job, like a 7C... and they are going for some amazing prices these days, you will likely sacrifice signal to noise ratio and hum in one of the lesser vintage tube pres... if you don't mind a bit of noise and really want that vintage feel go for it. Personally while I really appreciate an excellent tube preamp, I would go with a Solid State model if I couldn't find a top flight model within my budget.


Widget

[Bern1]

If you can't afford a better tube job, like a 7C... and they are going for some amazing prices these days, you will likely sacrifice signal to noise ratio and hum in one of the lesser vintage tube pres... if you don't mind a bit of noise and really want that vintage feel go for it. Personally while I really appreciate an excellent tube preamp, I would go with a Solid State model if I couldn't find a top flight model within my budget.


Widget

Got it, thanks for your thoughts. Vintage feel is it on this system. I do have a couple of other stereo sets that have good ss preamps, this one is for pure nostalgia in the present tense!

[Audiobeer]

The poster has a pair of 4311Bs. Nice speakers by the way, for what they are. That being said a good tube preamp that will enhance his system and not take away from it will equal the cost of 4 or 5 sets of 4311's to start. If your looking for a good vintage preamp and want to stay in the peroid of the 4311s and don't want to spend more than a few hundred you'll have to go with SS. Oh yeah.......in my humble opinion.

[Bern1]

The poster has a pair of 4311Bs. Nice speakers by the way, for what they are. That being said a good tube preamp that will enhance his system and not take away from it will equal the cost of 4 or 5 sets of 4311's to start. If your looking for a good vintage preamp and want to stay in the peroid of the 4311s and don't want to spend more than a few hundred you'll have to go with SS. Oh yeah.......in my humble opinion.

Understood Audiobeer, you speak with the voice of Reason and the "reasonable" side of me concurs.......but the crazy side of me wants to experience a wee bit of tube audio listening before the big hearse carries me off without a trailer hitch....

Who knows, maybe I'll be so bitten with a taste I'll sell off a bunch of vintage guitars and tube guitar amps to take a bigger bite of the apple!

[badman]

Understood Audiobeer, you speak with the voice of Reason and the "reasonable" side of me concurs.......but the crazy side of me wants to experience a wee bit of tube audio listening before the big hearse carries me off without a trailer hitch....

Who knows, maybe I'll be so bitten with a taste I'll sell off a bunch of vintage guitars and tube guitar amps to take a bigger bite of the apple!

If your needs are simple... the Bottlehead Quickie can be had for $99.... or $200 or so with all the bells and whistles. Just gotta sling a touch of solder. Word has it it sounds pretty good!

[Mr. Widget]

If your needs are simple... the Bottlehead Quickie can be had for $99.... or $200 or so with all the bells and whistles. Just gotta sling a touch of solder. Word has it it sounds pretty good!

Good call... I think he is going to go for an original Bottlehead "Foreplay" kit that is in that same price range.


Widget

[Bern1]

Good call... I think he is going to go for an original Bottlehead "Foreplay" kit that is in that same price range.


Widget

Done deal, now need a phono stage.....tube or ss? Why or why not?

Anybody have an old Bottlehead phono stage kit laying around? Built or not...doesn't matter. Or maybe some other tube phono stage kit? I'm looking for a good match for this original Foreplay.

As always, thanks for the time you spend crafting a response for somebody who knows virtually nothing about this stuff, what fun it is for me to learn!

Cheers all!

Bernie

[Krunchy]

Tubes need to be adjusted all the time. Why not go for a transistor pre? They can do a better job that a tube. Remember Mono?

Hi Rolf!
I am sorry but I have to dissagree with you on that, at least as far as integrated tube amps go (at least the "newer ones", I dont know about pre-amps first hand). I have a few tube amps and a couple of hybrid integrated amps that dont need any adjusting at all. Personally I love the sound of tube amps, I've been playing with a couple of jolida models which are not crazy expensive at all and I have to say that they are really clean sounding and produce a lovely quality of music.

Dont forget that sound can often be quite subjective as we all know. I have quite a few good ss amps as well and obviously there is a difference in the sound they reproduce but that is not a bad thing. "We've" (by that I mean the members of the forum) had this discussion before even the vinyl vs cd and the bottom line is we all have varying tastes in what we like. To make a blanket statement like that I dont think is fair.
I have a jolida 102B amp which is not a boutique tube amp (price wise) but the thing sounds pretty damn good to me. lately I've been switching out the stock tubes (electro-harmonix, which are not horrible but you can do better) with some NOS tubes and the difference is incredible. They are very detailed, crisp, clean and not lacking in bass at all. This particular amp only has to be biased/adjusted once or maybe twice a year if that, an exercise which takes all of 1 minute. I have also been rolling some NOS tubes into the hybrid amps with incredible results, the vincent sv-236 has never sounded better, it blows away anything else I have at the moment which includes some adcom 5802As, crown ps 400 and some other ss amps. I still like the sound of ss, in particular I like the adcom on the LF for the 4345s but the tube amps are no slouch, period.

This, of course, is my own personal opinion & preference, I love tubes & I dont feel like I am loosing anything by using them, on the contraray, I feel that I have increased my enjoyment of music with them.
My point is (not to attack you ) that Bern1 might actually have a genetic and or medical pre-desposition to tubes hence his desire to look into a tube pre amp.

Bern1, I dont know what your budget for this pre amp is but I am sure there is something out there that just might be what you are looking for, if not you can always sell it & look into getting one of the many ss pre amps that have been discussed on this forum which I myself would not mind auditioning.

Enjoy the hunt, thats half the fun

[martin_wu99]

Tubes need to be adjusted all the time. Why not go for a transistor pre? They can do a better job that a tube. Remember Mono?

Rolf,who told you that?you must take things people say with grain of salt
BTW,i like your big dog

[Rolf]

I just remember having an Audio Research Tube amp, and on it there was meeter's and there was pots that needed to be adjusted to set the meters at a certain point so the amp should sound the best it could. This was needed quite often.

Anyway, sorry to break in here and destroy the discussion. I'm out.

Rolf,who told you that?you must take things people say with grain of salt
BTW,i like your big dog

[martin_wu99]

I just remember having an Audio Research Tube amp, and on it there was meeter's and there was pots that needed to be adjusted to set the meters at a certain point so the amp should sound the best it could. This was needed quite often.

Anyway, sorry to break in here and destroy the discussion. I'm out.

Just joking,the discussion need you

[Cooljjay]

I just remember having an Audio Research Tube amp, and on it there was meeter's and there was pots that needed to be adjusted to set the meters at a certain point so the amp should sound the best it could. This was needed quite often.

Those pots are found on a lot of tube amplifiers not pre amps. They are to adjust the BIAS on each tube. But you can find fixed BIAS amps that need no adjusting at all. You just have to make sure all the resistor/capacitors are up to spec. Some better pre amps do need to be adjusted but the adjustment is for line level. It took me awhile to adjust the line levels but once set it is fine. Tube amps and pre amps are just so pretty to look at too They also keep the listening room nice and toast on those cold days

[martin_wu99]

I just remember having an Audio Research Tube amp, and on it there was meeter's and there was pots that needed to be adjusted to set the meters at a certain point so the amp should sound the best it could. This was needed quite often.

Anyway, sorry to break in here and destroy the discussion. I'm out.

Rolf,follow me studying Chenglish

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[Mctwins]

Tubes need to be adjusted all the time. Why not go for a transistor pre? They can do a better job that a tube. Remember Mono?

What?????? My tube preamp wich is McIntosh C2300 has none of adjustments what so ever. The best preamp I ever owned. As for my McIntosh amps MC275 there is no adjustments as well.

If someone want tube pre this would be the one.

Thanks