Thanks for the excellent review. You are the only person I take any notice of on the tube when it comes to honest reviews of amps. Your last review had me reaching for the plastic and again with this one too. I really enjoy the rounded sound that valves produce, I know it's not the so called "perfect sound" but I like it and it takes me back to when my grandparents sat and listened to their old valve radio in the evening. Nostalgia of Christmas carols and crooners. Really enjoy your humour and candidness in these unedited vids. Thank you again for taking your time and using your expertise to review these devices for the less technical community among us.
It's great to have a 'Feeeel Tech' moment again as it seems like yonks ago ! Regarding the the preamp I am afraid I run a mile from those things with the blue LED under the valves as to me that is pure Tat. Temu and Banggood stuff ! I thought at first when you pulled the valve that nothing happened which would not have surprised me at all, but like you I don't get the 'valve sound' vibe. Nice review....cheers.
Great video, I wish more of❤ UA-cam was like this. It goes deep, no silly nonsense. Putting emphasis on content rather than being overproduced and scant on value. Well done.
I think you would be better just using the 5532s for all the gain and tone control. All those valves will do is add colour, distortion and noise. Does not even clip symmetrically. By a long, long way. Take valves out of the circuit, you don't need voltage conversion cut the cost in half. It will be a better preamp overall.
People want that noise. For reasons hahaha. I always laugh when they say that tube sound is pure and clean. Ehhh no. They love distorsion. And you can always add that later. There is something named 2nd harmonic generator and is a simple circuit that do that and there are digital tube sound filters for music. There is a reason tube enthusiast hate negative feedback. Because it cleans the harmonics and make the amp sound more hifi.
Well, I have this silly idea that HiFi people strive for the best sound possible. The idea that ANY circuit should design in built distortion, is beyond words. Such people should change hobby's and take up stamp collecting. Another issue is the gain, if any, is very low from the valve, hence full of ICs Mostly because they often use RF valves that are cheap and nasty. Not made for audio at all. An EF86 or an ECC83 would be a better choice, actually made with audio in mind. The EF86 has much higher gain and no ICs would be needed. Better still ditch the valves completly. Leave the 40s in the past.@@andic6676
@@beverpix enjoy them until the western governments ban them for not being green. the filament can be categorized as the same as a filament of a light bulb.
Without tubes you could stack the power amp on top of the preamp. They should make some kind of a frame to fit over the tubes. Or just leave the tubes out.
All of these tube buffer preamps run these sharp cutoff pentodes at between 1/2 to 1/3 the normal design voltage that they were designed for(RF radar and RF small signal amp) to get substantial even order distortion to give the "tube" sound. If you look up the freq. vs gamma curves on these types of tubes, they do fall off at frequencies around 20hz and below esp. at the lower voltages. It's just the nature of this sort of beast
Thanks for the excellent review. You are the only person I take any notice of on the tube when it comes to honest reviews of amps.
Your last review had me reaching for the plastic and again with this one too.
I really enjoy the rounded sound that valves produce, I know it's not the so called "perfect sound" but I like it and it takes me back to when my grandparents sat and listened to their old valve radio in the evening. Nostalgia of Christmas carols and crooners.
Really enjoy your humour and candidness in these unedited vids.
Thank you again for taking your time and using your expertise to review these devices for the less technical community among us.
Glad to see new video from John, wish you settle down in new house, sure you got lot of "home" work shown from last video.
The first Big Clive impression was spot on! 😂
It's great to have a 'Feeeel Tech' moment again as it seems like yonks ago ! Regarding the the preamp I am afraid I run a mile from those things with the blue LED under the valves as to me that is pure Tat. Temu and Banggood stuff ! I thought at first when you pulled the valve that nothing happened which would not have surprised me at all, but like you I don't get the 'valve sound' vibe. Nice review....cheers.
Great video, I wish more of❤ UA-cam was like this. It goes deep, no silly nonsense. Putting emphasis on content rather than being overproduced and scant on value. Well done.
Seeing you shake the vacuum tubes out of the box like that made me laugh. It’s true most of us are accustomed to handling solid state components.
Those tubes are made for military use originally. Not too fragile.
I think you would be better just using the 5532s for all the gain and tone control. All those valves will do is add colour, distortion and noise. Does not even clip symmetrically. By a long, long way. Take valves out of the circuit, you don't need voltage conversion cut the cost in half. It will be a better preamp overall.
People want that noise. For reasons hahaha. I always laugh when they say that tube sound is pure and clean. Ehhh no. They love distorsion. And you can always add that later. There is something named 2nd harmonic generator and is a simple circuit that do that and there are digital tube sound filters for music. There is a reason tube enthusiast hate negative feedback. Because it cleans the harmonics and make the amp sound more hifi.
If it doesn't clip symmetrically, maybe they are deliberately biasing it for distortion?
Tube sound is reality, and some prefer the addition of harmonics by tubes/valves. It's all just a matter of taste.
Well, I have this silly idea that HiFi people strive for the best sound possible. The idea that ANY circuit should design in built distortion, is beyond words. Such people should change hobby's and take up stamp collecting. Another issue is the gain, if any, is very low from the valve, hence full of ICs Mostly because they often use RF valves that are cheap and nasty. Not made for audio at all. An EF86 or an ECC83 would be a better choice, actually made with audio in mind. The EF86 has much higher gain and no ICs would be needed. Better still ditch the valves completly. Leave the 40s in the past.@@andic6676
@@beverpix enjoy them until the western governments ban them for not being green. the filament can be categorized as the same as a filament of a light bulb.
3:16 thats a Big Clive reference 😅 and of course i said it. Feel Tech 😂
And me !
Clive is a unique chap
Hi John. Did you get another cat ? Loved Snickers soo much.
Without tubes you could stack the power amp on top of the preamp. They should make some kind of a frame to fit over the tubes. Or just leave the tubes out.
😂😅😂😅
Agreed. 2hy those tubes everywhere? Just preamp with volume and tone controls are totally fine and more convenient.
All of these tube buffer preamps run these sharp cutoff pentodes at between 1/2 to 1/3 the normal design voltage that they were designed for(RF radar and RF small signal amp) to get substantial even order distortion to give the "tube" sound. If you look up the freq. vs gamma curves on these types of tubes, they do fall off at frequencies around 20hz and below esp. at the lower voltages. It's just the nature of this sort of beast
Feeltech, quality instrument
Yeah, thank you. 🙏🏼, but what does it sound like?
Would love to see the SMSL AO300 put through its paces
Intresting! Would it drive a pair of P3 poweramps successfully? All channels driven..
1kOhm output impedance? This must be some mistake, maybe the wrong value of the resistor. I don't believe someone would do it on purpose.
It seems one of the tube socket needs to re-soldering.
great work -thx
Thanks John!
Where on the volume does it get distorted? about 2 aclock? 12:14
how big diff? with or without power amp?
Hey man.. love your videos. Hope you are well in health and that our Lord Jesus Christ is you Savior :)
👌🏿🔊🎵👌🏿
They look very much like a 12AX7 valve, high gain low noise twin triode from the 60's.
They're RF pentodes, actually. Go figure... :-)
@@generessler6282 That's just weird.
A cheap and nasty choice probably adds more colour and distension. It offers almost no gain, that's the job of the 5532@@generessler6282