Bennybuis wrote:
good job so far, I am very curious about how it will sound. I haven't had the liberty to listen to a triode pp amp so far, tempted to build one just because of that. I prefer a pp amp any day over se, we had a lot of discussions about that. That is just my opinion based on my very own experience. It is true, a pp amp is much more tedious to build and to develop a world class amp you need some tools like a good signal generator and o-scope. Not much to archive with intuition, I tell you. Lots of folks prefer se amps for the simple reason, those are much easier to build and much more forgiving, but when it comes to reproducing music, a well build pp amp will outperform any se amp any day. (IMHO)
My guess is I'll agree with that assessment after I finish my KT88 oddwatt (it's sooooo close).
I typically don't like distortion. It would be fair to say I hate distortion where it's not wanted, especially hard clipping. But the SET amp is "strange". The distortion that is produced at low drive levels is inaudible to my ears, even though it's probably well over 1% (I'm guessing based on what I've read - I didn't measure it). When you "crank it up" it's difficult to determine how loud you can turn it. You can basically (speakers allowing) turn it up as loud as you want to depending on how much distortion you can tolerate. The thing is, the distortion is actually pleasant on some sources. I now know the meaning of the term "euphonic distortion". A little bit of 2nd order harmonic distortion can make strings and voice "come alive". The amp is actually NOT reproducing the source faithfully, it's introducing low order even harmonic distortion. The "artificially created octave" which is essentially what it's generating adds something to the sound.
This is great - sometimes. I certainly don't want to always be limited by power and distortion. If I had to choose one amplifier to own, it would be a higher power amp with very low distortion, whatever that amp may be. It would not be a SET. However, this amp has its place, it sounds awesome IMHO and behaves very differently than any SS amp or any amp for that matter I've ever owned. That's why I like it so much. It "chimes". Having played tube guitar amps for decades I can hear the hint of distortion, but it's perceived as an increase in clarity and richness rather than distortion as long as it's not driven too hard. This effect is especially apparent on strings and voice. It's basically good sounding distortion, if there is such a thing in the world of hi-fi.
I want my PP amp to have less distortion and more power, and it will. What that translates to in terms of sound I can't wait to find out. I'm expecting a "tighter" sound than the SET, more comparable to a good SS amp (but better of course), and I don't anticipate that the 3rd order distortion component (and higher order odd harmonics) will be pleasing to the ear. I don't anticipate purposefully driving the amp into distortion like I do with the SET.
It's a long holiday weekend here in the US so maybe that oddwatt will be finished and fired up in a few days.
Thanks for the help.
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