Thinking of trying some glass....

[Tj Bassi]

Hi all,

At the urgence of some friends, I am thinking of auditioning some tube amplifiers. Although our current system is a 5.1-based theater rig (Requests, Theater, Scripts, Descent sub), an opportunity to build a dedicated audio room has come up and I feel that now is a good time to consider a change in gear.
The front end of our system is run by a trio of Krell 250m's, which by all standards are great amps, but I've never run the Requests with anything but solid-state and want to at least give tubes a try. I have been offered a pair of Audio Research 100 monos to use for a few weeks.
Having no experience with glass amps, I was wondering if the electrostatic (i.e. low nominal impedance) speakers pose a problem with certain amps, and if any members have any thoughts on which amps might work well, and which might not.

Thanks,
Tj

 

[aliveatfive]

ARC tubes and ML electrostats are a match made in heaven. I heard them this way for the first time in '88 and I've never deviated from this opinion. What amps are you going to try?

 

[Spike]

Go for it...

I have been offered a pair of Audio Research 100 monos to use for a few weeks.

In my opinions, the Audio Research amplifiers are much more musical than the solid-state Krell in the sense that they are smoother and have better mids. They do take a back seat to the Krell in the bass slam, and control department (as do most other amplifiers on the market). You should definitely give tubes a try on your ReQuests and hear for yourself. The ultimate test is to have the ARC on the panels and the Krell on the bass and see how they complement each other! The drawback with ARC is the cost and effort for maintenance. Biasing the tubes requires quite a bit of work, as with the requirement for (expensive) matched quad tubes. For my system, I much prefer the Cary amplifiers over the Audio Research counterparts but that's just me. You can do a search here for my various posts touching on comparison between Cary & ARC amplifiers.

Good luck
Spike

 

[Tj Bassi]

amps to try...

ARC tubes and ML electrostats are a match made in heaven. I heard them this way for the first time in '88 and I've never deviated from this opinion. What amps are you going to try?

I was offered a pair of Audio research 100m's, but I'll clarify the model # of the amps later tonite. Another friend has a pair of ASL Hurricanes but he 'thinks' the electrostats might be a problem load for them. Point is moot because he is hesistant about my trying them

Tj

 

[aliveatfive]

I think the Hurricanes would have no problem with them. I always wanted to hear a pair of them in my system. They might be overkill in my current Summit system. Most tube amps do not seem to have trouble with low impedance loads.

 

[DTB300]

I think the Hurricanes would have no problem with them. I always wanted to hear a pair of them in my system.

I have heard them driving some VMPS speakers. Lower volumes there were not bad, but did not overwhelm or WOW me. When driven to higher volumes the sound got much worse.

I would like to have a chance to hear them on some other setups, just to see if the amps or speakers were the issues I was hearing.

Dan

 

[kach22i]

Once you've had glass, you never go back.

 

[DTB300]

Once you've had glass, you never go back.

Yep the same thing happened to me......once I had glass, I then went to Plinius and never went back

 

[Tj Bassi]

Your Plinius is a tube amp?

Tj

 

[kach22i]

Your Plinius is a tube amp?

Tj

No his amp is solid state, and I was making a small joke.

Different strokes for different folks.

 

[DTB300]

No his amp is solid state, and I was making a small joke.

Just adding to the joke and wondering who would catch on.... just like the Spinal Tap line...some get it some don't.....BTW, Class A Solid State...tremendous when designed correctly

Dan

 

[Jeff Zaret]

I got the joke.

 

[Craig]

Another friend has a pair of ASL Hurricanes but he 'thinks' the electrostats might be a problem load for them. Point is moot because he is hesistant about my trying them

The Hurricanes are very powerful as far as tube amps go. I believe they are rated at 200w per channel and would have no problem at all driving any of the MLs. You'd surprised at how well a relatively low wattage tube amp will drive electrostats compared to a relatively low wattage SS amp.

 

[Steve Daigneault]

The Arc'swill give you a taste of tubes, but there is more to taste if you like the direction you go when hearing the arc amps. i happened to love the VTL amp i heard on my aerius i, and *really* loved both the VAC 70/70 and Cary 805c. i agree that you can probably get by with a lower powered tube amp as long as it's transformers are built to drive lower impedences. VAC, ARC, CJ, VTL, Manley all would work...

 

[Tj Bassi]

It was with trembling hands that I asked if the Plinius was a tube unit (!) Silly me...hopefully everyone got a chuckle out of that....

Thanks for the informative input. It will be a few weeks before I can babysit the AR amps but the good news is that they will be mine to use for the better part of a month. Cant wait to try them....

Tj

 

[DTB300]

Thanks for the informative input. It will be a few weeks before I can babysit the AR amps but the good news is that they will be mine to use for the better part of a month. Cant wait to try them....

Good luck with the ARC Amps...Having them for a month should really give you time to decide if you like them or not. While you have them for the month, see if you can get any other amps to compare them against in your home - the best way to audition equipment.

Dan

 

[kach22i]

I got the joke.

I did not, looking up some quotes now, it's been a few years since I watched the move.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0088258/quotes

This is funny.................................

http://www.rotten.com/library/culture/spinal-tap/

DIBERGI: What do you call this?

TUFNEL: Well, this piece is called "Lick My Love Pump."

And perhaps the best of all, there's the scene where Nigel Tufnel demonstrates the band's amplifiers, all of which are fitted with dials that go up to eleven instead of the usual ten:

DIBERGI: Does that mean it's louder? Is it any louder?

TUFNEL: Well, it's one louder, isn't it? It's not ten. You see, most blokes, you know, will be playing at ten. You're on ten here, all the way up, all the way up, all the way up, you're on ten on your guitar. Where can you go from there? Where?

DIBERGI: I don't know.

TUFNEL: Nowhere. Exactly. What we do is, if we need that extra push over the cliff, you know what we do?

DIBERGI: Put it up to eleven.

TUFNEL: Eleven. Exactly. One louder.

DIBERGI: Why don't you just make ten louder and make ten be the top number and make that a little louder?

TUFNEL: (Extremely long pause) These go to eleven.

 

[TheBobGoat]

im glad i could contribute to everyones hapiness.. im going to bring that dvd to work tonight and play it for the unenlightened. it is one of the few movies i brought with me to the land of bird flu

does anyone live in the seattle area though? or even near spangdahlem or ramstein germany? i would love to hear some ML's hooked up to nice equipment -- before i decide what kind of gear to pick up myself

 

[DTB300]

does anyone live in the seattle area though?

I cannot remember what branch you are with, but if you ever get to Andrews AFB, let me know as I live about 30 mins away.

Dan

 

[Craig]

I cannot remember what branch you are with

He's an Air Force C-17 pilot (the only branch with big planes). There's a good chance of him stopping into Andrews AFB sometime. However, since he flys C-17s he'll be in and out of Charleston AFB, SC often.

Bob, (actually I'm supposed to call you "sir" since you out rank me even though my son is probably older than you are)

Sir,
If you ever fly into MacDill AFB let me know, I'm in Tampa.