Tube amp advice


I am thinking of trying out tube amps. My current amps are Kharmas (MP150). My speakers are Wilson Benesch and they are not an easy load (sensitivity is 86 db, impedence 6 ohms).

So, it would seem I will need a pretty perky tube amp. Some research has shown me that the EAR 890 and the Rogue M-150's are good values in my general price range, are well regarded, and are powerful enough to drive my speakers effectively.

Any thoughts on how these two amps compare? Any thoughts on other amps that might work well?

Thanks in advance.

--dan
dgaylin
Hey guys thanks for the advice. Much appreciated. I forgot to mention that I am also interested in balanced inputs.

Thanks.
There's a fair amount of misunderstanding about tube amps and what distinguishes a good one from everything else. To drive speakers that feature low impedences in the bass, a tube amp's wattage rating is largely irrelevant - what matters is the quality of its output transformers, which convert voltage to current, and how stiff (robust) its power supplies are. Really good output transformers are extremely expensive and heavy, and stiff power supplies are very heavy. Thus, there's an old adage, which is generally quite true, that the heavier and more expensive a tube amp is, the better it's going to sound on hard-to-drive speakers. To put things in perspective, 100 watt/channel tube amps tend to weigh 50 lbs. to 80 lbs. What is generally recognized by knowledgeable audiophiles as the most "powerful" regular production tube amp, the CAT monoblocks, put out 100 or 200 watts/channel (depending upon the model), but weigh 192 lbs. per chassis and cost $30k to $50k (depending upon the model). In short, most tube amps, including those that the magazines have concluded are "good", really can't drive tough-to-drive speakers like Wilsons (or anything else that drops below 4 Ohms in the bass).

An amp that was well built and is available for very reasonable prices used is the Sonic Frontiers Power 2 (it features balanced inputs, but is single-ended). If you can go up to $3k or $4k, the BAT VK-75 SE is a good amp that is fully differential balanced. Also for $4K is the VAC 70/70 (Mk. III or Signature), which is an amp I have owned for ten years. It is a tremendous amp that does it all (fully point-to-point wired and fully Class A biased, zero feedback, directly heated triode 300B output tubes, auto-biasing, sentry circuit to automatically shut down out-of-spec tubes, and totally dual-mono all the way down to separate power cords and on/off switches - the amp will drive 1 Ohm loads), but it does not have balanced inputs - I run a balanced cable to it from my balanced preamp, and use Neutrik convertors on its single-ended inputs.

My advice is to stay away from tube amps for low impedance speakers unless you are prepared to spend what it takes to get one that can do the job. Unfortunately, most tube amps manufactured these days cannot.

Good luck.
I drive my JM Labs Focal Electra 936s with Amps that weigh 80 lbs a piece and are rated at 75- 78 WPC. The Focals are rated at a nominal 8 ohm impedence but have a 3.8 ohm min. impedence.
I agree with Raquel the output trannys must be big and heavy, to do the job right, the combined weight is about 160 lbs. They do a truly fantastic job and are very under rated, they are Opera Consonance Cyber 800 mono blocks. In fact they got a Blue Moon Award on 6 Moons, I encourage you to read the review. They List for $3995 new but you can usually get a deal on them. Used they sell for less than half that if you can find them.
E-mail me for a vendor who I know will give you a good price. No affiliation etc. But keep an open mind and ear these really punch way above their weight. (unitentional pun)