Hi all,

I was wondering if anyone can make a recommendation for a high quality tube
amp & loudspeaker kit for a poor, and sometimes starving[mostly pizza diet]
:-), beginning EE student? My goal is learn the inside and outs of tube &
integrated circuit technology and also study it's relationship to
interconnect cables, speaker cables, connects, and speakers. This obviously
is a lot to learn, but I have to begin somewhere.

Thanks in advance for your help/pointers.

PT

"Philip Thomas" wrote in
news:91hXb.301138$I06.3069432@attbi_s01:

Hi all,

I was wondering if anyone can make a recommendation for a high quality
tube amp & loudspeaker kit for a poor, and sometimes starving[mostly
pizza diet]
:-), beginning EE student? My goal is learn the inside and outs of tube
:&
integrated circuit technology and also study it's relationship to
interconnect cables, speaker cables, connects, and speakers. This
obviously is a lot to learn, but I have to begin somewhere.

Thanks in advance for your help/pointers.

PT



Good for you Philip! But here you have to be very careful to mention
cables! Somebody will jump on you and bite you till death!

Anyway, as far as tube amp concern, I will recommend you to start with
integrated amp. (it is cheaper, and didn't sound that bad), try the made
in China tube amp. because they are very good and cheap. You know, quite
a lot of the so called "Euproean tube components" are actually OEM from
China.

Recently, I tried Mei Xing (Ming Da), and they are very good. You can go
to: http://www.tubeampaudio.com to see the look of them, or if you want a
little higher, you can try Audio-Space: http://www.audiospace-hifi.com.
We are talking about US$700 for a class AB integrated amp.

Speakers in the major concern, because I have never experience a cheap
speaker that give you good sound. Because of the characteristic of the
tub amp, you want a pair of speakers that will give you good bass. Try
some 2-way bookshelf to start with, but even a pair of B&W 705 will
easily cost you US$1500/pair, or you might want to have a look the new
Soliloquy 6.0 bookshelf, about the same price. Email me if you want to
more infomation, I might be able to find you some good deal. I have
connections...

Hope that help!

Lawrence Leung

Philip Thomas wrote:

Hi all,

I was wondering if anyone can make a recommendation for a high quality tube
amp & loudspeaker kit for a poor, and sometimes starving[mostly pizza diet]
:-), beginning EE student? My goal is learn the inside and outs of tube &
integrated circuit technology and also study it's relationship to
interconnect cables, speaker cables, connects, and speakers. This obviously
is a lot to learn, but I have to begin somewhere.

Thanks in advance for your help/pointers.

Jolida makes a nice small amplifier, IIRC. Speakers - just get something,
anything over 89-90db efficiency and you should be fine. Roughly $500 street
price. Ebay is a bit hit and miss. I like www.audiogon.com for deals.

A search for Jolida there pulls up a bunch of hits.
http://cgi.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/cl.p...ube&1081273566
There you go - $400 with upgraded tubes.

As for speakers, build your own from kits. On a tight
budget, these are probably the best value if you have the time.
www.partsexpress.com has a few DIY projects, but the best, IMO,
are from www.madisound.com

http://www.madisound.com/catalog.html - kits are near the bottom.

Even the little $208 Sledgeling is probably going to be better than
anything under $500 comercially. The Eton 8.1 - I don't know if
that price includes cabinets or not, but $500 isn't impossibly
high. http://www.madisound.com/BK16.html - that also looks good as
well.

I'm assuming that you have about $800-$1000 for a budget - or is it more?

Thanks Lawrence,

I'll go and check out the B&W website to read about the speakers, as for the
integrated amps, where can I find out how much it costs to buy the "Mei
Xing" amps? There is no pricing on there website or for that matter any real
information on how to buy one in the USA. Any suggestions?

I'll email these guys to
"Lawrence Leung" wrote in message
news:hQvXb.38258$_44.32217@attbi_s52...
"Philip Thomas" wrote in
news:91hXb.301138$I06.3069432@attbi_s01:

Hi all,

I was wondering if anyone can make a recommendation for a high quality
tube amp & loudspeaker kit for a poor, and sometimes starving[mostly
pizza diet]
:-), beginning EE student? My goal is learn the inside and outs of tube
:&
integrated circuit technology and also study it's relationship to
interconnect cables, speaker cables, connects, and speakers. This
obviously is a lot to learn, but I have to begin somewhere.

Thanks in advance for your help/pointers.

PT



Good for you Philip! But here you have to be very careful to mention
cables! Somebody will jump on you and bite you till death!

Anyway, as far as tube amp concern, I will recommend you to start with
integrated amp. (it is cheaper, and didn't sound that bad), try the made
in China tube amp. because they are very good and cheap. You know, quite
a lot of the so called "Euproean tube components" are actually OEM from
China.

Recently, I tried Mei Xing (Ming Da), and they are very good. You can go
to: http://www.tubeampaudio.com to see the look of them, or if you want a
little higher, you can try Audio-Space: http://www.audiospace-hifi.com.
We are talking about US$700 for a class AB integrated amp.

Speakers in the major concern, because I have never experience a cheap
speaker that give you good sound. Because of the characteristic of the
tub amp, you want a pair of speakers that will give you good bass. Try
some 2-way bookshelf to start with, but even a pair of B&W 705 will
easily cost you US$1500/pair, or you might want to have a look the new
Soliloquy 6.0 bookshelf, about the same price. Email me if you want to
more infomation, I might be able to find you some good deal. I have
connections...

Hope that help!

Lawrence Leung

For speaker kits, try either Madisound, in Madison, Wisconsin, or Zalytron,
on Long Island in New York.

For amps, I believe there is a company affiliated with Cary Audio in Cary,
N.C.-I think it's called Audio Electronic Design.
"Philip Thomas" wrote in message
news:91hXb.301138$I06.3069432@attbi_s01...
Hi all,

I was wondering if anyone can make a recommendation for a high quality
tube
amp & loudspeaker kit for a poor, and sometimes starving[mostly pizza
diet]
:-), beginning EE student? My goal is learn the inside and outs of tube &
integrated circuit technology and also study it's relationship to
interconnect cables, speaker cables, connects, and speakers. This
obviously
is a lot to learn, but I have to begin somewhere.

Thanks in advance for your help/pointers.

PT

For your speakers, it can be interesting to build a kit using a decent
and very sensitive full range loudspeaker, such as the Fostex FE206e (I
admit I haven't heard it, but read a bit about it). The combination of
such a speaker and a low power tube amp usually gets good reviews.
The Fe206e (see
http://www.fostex.co.jp/int/pages/pr...6e_enclrev.pdf
) costs only $168.60 + shipping per pair at www.madisound.com and there
is a link to the awesome horn enclosure you can build (not so
expensively) yourself but you need some time:
http://www.madisound.com/206e_encl.pdf . Actually this design is LOVED
by quite a few people and it is so sensitive that the paint will fall
from the walls with a 7W amp.
Remember with a full range speaker you don't need a filter nor extra
speakers to cover the frequency range, so it's cost effective. FR
speakers sound very "direct" and immediate because of this simplicity
and usually also give a great 3D representation since everything comes
from 1 point. However they can be an acquired taste, the Fe206e isn't
linear at all (yet people rarely complain about too much high, rather
about not enough bass, which if you think about it is basically the
same), and sensitive FR speakers usually won't give deepest bass, making
them less suited for electronic dance music (but ok for all the rest).
Still, if you have the time, this is a much more interesting/challenging
and certainly more wacky path to follow than buying decent yet
somewhat... staid B&W speakers.
I think I will once make the double bass reflex box (
http://www.fostex.co.jp/int/pages/pr...7e_enclrev.pdf
) for the slightly less cheap shielded Fe207e (
http://www.madisound.com/FE207E.pdf ), I prefer this design's frequency
response. Still I hope to first be able to compare the 2 designs, since
linearity isn't everything in speaker appreciation.
Finally, if cost really is an object, or if you want to make a slightly
smaller box, then I read quite a few good comments about the FE103e
(http://www.madisound.com/fe103e.pdf for only $63 pp) in it's
recommended horn enclosu http://www.madisound.com/103e_enclrev.pdf
This one is often recommended for "your first full range horn speaker
project".

I hope this helps or at least entertained you !!!

Tom

ps do note that I point to the fostex site for 2 designs since they are
more up to date than the PDFs at madisound.


Philip Thomas wrote:
Hi all,

I was wondering if anyone can make a recommendation for a high quality tube
amp & loudspeaker kit for a poor, and sometimes starving[mostly pizza diet]
:-), beginning EE student? My goal is learn the inside and outs of tube &
integrated circuit technology and also study it's relationship to
interconnect cables, speaker cables, connects, and speakers. This obviously
is a lot to learn, but I have to begin somewhere.

Thanks in advance for your help/pointers.

PT

Tom,

Thank you for all this information , I do have a question, what should I do
for the crossover? Do you have any recommendations for a decent out of the
box or DIY crossover setup?

Thanks,

PT
"Tom Alaerts" wrote in message
...
For your speakers, it can be interesting to build a kit using a decent
and very sensitive full range loudspeaker, such as the Fostex FE206e (I
admit I haven't heard it, but read a bit about it). The combination of
such a speaker and a low power tube amp usually gets good reviews.
The Fe206e (see

http://www.fostex.co.jp/int/pages/pr...6e_enclrev.pdf
) costs only $168.60 + shipping per pair at www.madisound.com and there
is a link to the awesome horn enclosure you can build (not so
expensively) yourself but you need some time:
http://www.madisound.com/206e_encl.pdf . Actually this design is LOVED
by quite a few people and it is so sensitive that the paint will fall
from the walls with a 7W amp.
Remember with a full range speaker you don't need a filter nor extra
speakers to cover the frequency range, so it's cost effective. FR
speakers sound very "direct" and immediate because of this simplicity
and usually also give a great 3D representation since everything comes
from 1 point. However they can be an acquired taste, the Fe206e isn't
linear at all (yet people rarely complain about too much high, rather
about not enough bass, which if you think about it is basically the
same), and sensitive FR speakers usually won't give deepest bass, making
them less suited for electronic dance music (but ok for all the rest).
Still, if you have the time, this is a much more interesting/challenging
and certainly more wacky path to follow than buying decent yet
somewhat... staid B&W speakers.
I think I will once make the double bass reflex box (

http://www.fostex.co.jp/int/pages/pr...7e_enclrev.pdf
) for the slightly less cheap shielded Fe207e (
http://www.madisound.com/FE207E.pdf ), I prefer this design's frequency
response. Still I hope to first be able to compare the 2 designs, since
linearity isn't everything in speaker appreciation.
Finally, if cost really is an object, or if you want to make a slightly
smaller box, then I read quite a few good comments about the FE103e
(http://www.madisound.com/fe103e.pdf for only $63 pp) in it's
recommended horn enclosu http://www.madisound.com/103e_enclrev.pdf
This one is often recommended for "your first full range horn speaker
project".

I hope this helps or at least entertained you !!!

Tom

ps do note that I point to the fostex site for 2 designs since they are
more up to date than the PDFs at madisound.


Philip Thomas wrote:
Hi all,

I was wondering if anyone can make a recommendation for a high quality
tube
amp & loudspeaker kit for a poor, and sometimes starving[mostly pizza
diet]
:-), beginning EE student? My goal is learn the inside and outs of tube
&
integrated circuit technology and also study it's relationship to
interconnect cables, speaker cables, connects, and speakers. This
obviously
is a lot to learn, but I have to begin somewhere.

Thanks in advance for your help/pointers.

PT

"Philip Thomas" wrote in
:

Tom,

Thank you for all this information , I do have a question, what should
I do for the crossover? Do you have any recommendations for a decent
out of the box or DIY crossover setup?

Thanks,

PT

No! The crossover design greatly depends on what kind of tweeter/mid-
range/woofer that you're going to use.

However, just type "crossover board design" under any search engine, you'll
get tons of project, pick one you like.

Or use the DIY kit from either www.madisound.com or www.partsexpress.com.

I mean, to start the speaker project, choose the inexpensive one and listen
to the sound first, then you might be able to do some tweak, may be change
the tweeter or woofer, change a couple of components on your crossover
board something like that, and let the fun begin!

Lawrence Leung

Philip Thomas wrote:

Tom,

Thank you for all this information , I do have a question, what should I do
for the crossover? Do you have any recommendations for a decent out of the
box or DIY crossover setup?

Well, a full-range speaker won't need one. Some people I know have also
used coaxial car speakers for this reason - $80 a pair and then you just
need to calculate and build decent cabinets for them. Of course, they
are almost all 4 ohm, so a truly tiny tube amp is probably not going to
cut it.