Watts, are watts, are watts? ('Tube watts' and 'solid state watts')

Lovely.

 

more reading here...

http://www.decware.com

 

I'm using a SS pure class A 60 wpc Pass designed amp with very highly sensitive corner horns 104 db/w. Best all round sound I've got from these speakers yet.

 

Damian, You are right - a watt is a watt (1 volt X 1 amp) no matter where is comes from. There are actually two things going on here, one has already been discussed a lot, the soft clipping. The other is how amp power ratings are done and a difference between how tubes and SS handle real music. Today almost all power ratings are done by feeding the amp a continuous sine wave signal and seeing how much power (watts) the amp will put out continuously without clipping. Way back when (I think in the 1950"s) some amps were rated for peak instantaneous power, which is what the amp can produce just for a burst of signal but not for very long. This can very badly exaggerate how much power the amp can put out continuously so today the continuous power rating is used. Tubes, however, are usually capable of putting out more instantaneous power for a given continuous power rating than SS devices are. Since music is not a continuous sine wave, for some music it will play louder on tubes than SS for the same continuous power rating and all else being equal. Here is link from Stereo[phile on tubes that I found. I also read an article on this power thing sometime ago but I could not find a link. http://www.stereophile.com/features/357/