$1,198 for Quicksilver headphone amplifier
not $3,200
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The problem is that Tube amps don’t really come in High Quality. low cost variants.
The components dictate a minimum cost for at least anything transformer coupled.
A traditional transformer coupled tube amp needs a high voltage supply (with very low noise), a filament supply and a pair of output transformers, and that just adds up, before you get to the tubes themselves.
There are a few standout lower cost transformer coupled amps, though many are no longer available.
SW51+ very low production run, Made in Russia, he wound the ouput transformers himself, so the cost was lower.
Haggerman Tuba - no longer in production, he used a “parafeed” output, that means he could use cheaper output transfomers.
The Quicksilver Headphone Amp - a more traditional design, Mike I believe winds his own transformers as well, but it’s made in the USA, the most expensive of the 3, but IMO having heard all of them the best of the 3.
Now having said that for the Bokeh, you might get away with an OTL design, those can be a lot cheaper (no output transformer, often lower voltages, often no chokes in the PSU), but they don’t always play well with all headphones, and a lot of what people hear in higher end tube designs is because of the transformers and not just the tubes.
A lot of people like the Schiit Vali as a low cost OTL amp, and it’s probably good for what it is.
But there is a lot of misconception from people who’ve only heard lower priced tube amps about what tube amps sound like, the spectrum can be all the way from ooey gooey bloated bass to clean precise and in some cases even bass light.
FWIW the sky really is the limit on what you can spend on a tube amp, when you get into Output transformers with silver windings and nano crystalline cores the prices for the components are insane. I designed and built a 2A3 amp as an exercise in trying to better understand the challenges and it’s an expensive endeavor just to get the parts.
Things get REALLY expensive when you get into the big tubes where they require plate voltages upwards of 1000V, it’s just the reality of tube circuits, they are usually extremely simple, but that means they don’t reject power supply noise well, and so you move all the complexity into the power supply, and high voltage power supplies get expensive quickly.
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Yes they do, the gremlin is excellent and I recommend it. Only 120 usd
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I might be weird, but I enjoyed all of my tube experiences, are some better than others? Yes, do I actually know the difference between the designs? No.
I can say that my Dragon Inspire IHA-1 is fanfreakingtastic, but my first tube experience was an amazon special and it sounded terrible but I loved it because it was different. The barrel plug didn’t even make a good connection and my review ended the product on Amazon as soon as it started. Damned thing would spark if I bumped the power plug. But I was hooked, it was on some Hifiman HE400i’s and extremely distorted.
If you want a good budget tube amp and want to do some tube rolling try the little dot MKII or the Darkvoice SE336, both are affordable and an excellent experience. If you don’t like the sound…. change the damned tubes until you find a setup that you enjoy. Even my Inspire left something lacking but luckily I ordered a second set of tubes and I don’t think I’ll order another set for quite some time.
I did get an Xduoo MT-602 hybrid amp for my lower impedance headphones but I really don’t use it. I enjoy difficult to drive headphones and pure tubes.
Like someone mentioned, no one can answer that for you. Tubes are highly subjective. If you want to mess with the sound try an entry level tube amp and be happy, roll some tubes until it tickles your pickle. Cheap tubes can be had but I got all of mine for the mentioned amp’s before the current world state and they all came from Russia. So I don’t know the state of tubes now.
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Hi folks, sorry for reviving this topic, it seemed close enough for the issue I have. After years of listening to music through my Bluesound Node + Harman Kardon HK6500 + Mission 737 Renaissance stack, I decided to treat myself to some proper closed-back HiFi headphones. After listening to Meze 99 Classic v1 in a store, I decided to go with ZMF Bokeh closed as I liked the tuning but felt they could use a little more refinement, detail and staging, which is exactly what the Bokeh promised. After doing some exploring and reading through many a forum discussion, I went with Schiit Mimir as DAC and Schiit Valhalla 3 as amp, specifically because I kept coming across claims of ZMFs magical synergy with tubes. While I was worried about the dampening factor and impedance mismatch, I felt it had to be ok as some folks had the exact same combo and claimed it sounded amazing. So it all finally arrived, I plugged it in, let the tubes warm up, put on Shine on you crazy diamond (as I felt it would be a good test of how musical a headphone is and how nice a stage it crafts) and… profound disappointment. The stage was narrow and shallow to the point of it having 0 depth, the guitars were thin and lacked the same richness I heard on this track even on cheap bluetooth earbuds, there was no punch whatsoever, the bass was barely there, the sax was thin, and the whole thing sounded bland, boring and uninspiring, total opposite from the fun and addictive sound that was advertised to me. No matter, tried a different track (Amie by Damien Rice), and again, it fell flat on its face - the breathy, intimate vocals were now just a guy talking loudly and monotonously in my ear, violating my personal space, and being overpowered by the strings that were supposed to separate nicely on the side. No sign of the emotional impact and tonal richness that I heard on this track on all the gear I ever had. Track after track of this - there were glimpses of niceness overshadowed by the overwhelming blandness, fatiguing mids, lack of energy and a tiny box the sound was allowed to exist in. Meze 99 classics was blowing this thing out of the water and I was regretting not buying that. I tried swapping every link in my chain, afraid that something was broken, but it sounded pretty much the same on my HK6500, and the Denon and Marantz speaker amps in the shop. To make things weirder, the Beyerdynamics DT770 (I believe the 80ohm model) I also tried on the Denon and Marantz sounded almost the same and suffered from the same lack of energy and excitement. Particularly noteworthy was the Karl Jenkins - Adiemus, which sounded so heavily compressed that the percussions might as well have not been there, and Osibisa - Sunshine day which is one of the most exciting and fun tracks I ever listened to on any gear I had the pleasure to hear it on, except this - here it was just weirdly shaped, with vocals somehow pushed back and sounding muffled and bass not doing it’s thing at all. Vocals on this headphone sound unnatural to put it mildly, and everyone compliments it on its naturalness. The stage is painfully small and narrow, not only staying within my head but somehow staying between my eyes - again something it has been complimented on. I am almost certain something is wrong, but I tried everthing and got the same result, even other headphones - that’s where I started believing the dampening factor was to blame. The only constant in the experiment is the high output impedance every amp had. The reason I was refusing to believe this was that people with exact same setup loved it. So now I don’t know what to think. I will eventually test it with a solid state headphone amp, once I get my hands on it somewhere, but in the meantime I would really like to discuss this and check if anyone else has felt this. I acknowledge a part of this could be due to my high expectations, but still, I know what good hifi is capable of, and I still manage to have a lot of fun with sony bt speakers and headphones, all kinds of cheap earbuds, vintage speakers and everything in between. I really really want to love these headphones - they were bought to celebrate an important milestone in my life and I can’t bear the thought of not listening to them or hating it when I do. Can the impedance mismatch alone be responsible and why do people like the valhalla 3 + bokeh closed combo then?
Looking at the numbers, the Bokeh Closed is 80 ohm impedance. This amp in no feedback mode has a 60 Ohm impedance. That means - relative to driving a high impedance headphone - 300 Ohm like most ZMF and many Sennheisers - you’ll start to see bass emphasis at around 100 hz.. Probably about +1 to +1.5db. At 60 hz, about 2db, and at 30 hz 2 or 3 DB depending on the headphone’s impedance peak, which I don’t happen to know.
Above 100 hz, there isn’t much difference.
Damping factor is just an impedance ratio. For your Bokeh it’s about 1.3
For a 300 ohm headphone its 5
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There are too many variables and unknowns to make a conclusion.
My advice would be to get a basic solid state playback chain working. Doesn’t have to be “high end”, $200-300 dac/amp will work.
This allows you to try your different headphones and see how they sound without tube/impedance issues involved. Note that when trying different headphones only the headphone should change - the dac, amp, cable type (single ended or balanced), device settings, etc. should stay the same.
Then you can use your tube amp with your various headphones and see what changes.
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The Bokeh sounds pretty great with even OTL tube amps. 80 ohms turns out to be plenty to allow good sound from high impedance amps. Ive tried the TA66 with the Bokeh and it sounds fantastic. Others on head fi have had the same experience. Ive also tried the Bokeh with my AmpsandSound Forge 32/300. Even the 300 ohm tap (which is around 100 ohms of OI) sounds great with the Bokeh. The bass is full and rich. Ive heard that the Valhalla 3 is very clean and neutral. Maybe that is what is going on?