I keep hearing people refer to the magic of the "tube sound". Surprisingly, I couldn't find many recorded samples while googling around. I think I'm from the wrong generation...and just wanted a taste without shelling out cash for a tube preamp or amplifier.

So, anyone ever loop a tube preamp through their soundcard and post samples?

I can find a bunch of tube simulators online(as opposed to recordings)...but many look shady, and I wouldn't know how to tune them anyway. I want to hear the sound as intended.

Oh...one more question. I see a bunch of impulse responses for different tubed devices online. But isn't most tube distortion non-linear? IIRC convolving is a linear operation.

I'd ask in more audiophile oriented forums, but most of them probably wouldn't believe it could be "captured by a digital recording" or some other poppycock.

There once were "DCC-Gold discs" Some of them were direct master to tube to digital and therefore advertised as Tube sounding digital recordings.
Maybe you can get your fingers on one of these.

Thanks for the tip. I actually have a few albums that I know were mastered with tubes(although probably in a more convoluted manner than the DCC recordings). It'd be nice if I could compare tube and non-tube samples in order to understand the differences though.

Or maybe you can get hold of old pre-60s radios. They generally have tube amplifiers. Tho they're somewhat collector's items, you might find a cheap one at a flea market or garage sale. Also not the state of the art-technology but for getting an impression of the "tube sound" they're sufficient.

IIRC tubes' warm sound was due to delayed passing of high frequencies, so when one instrument produced a certain spectrum and the low freqs are heard first, it's heard as "warm". Somebody with more knowledge should be able to explain better.

Anyway, if that's all tubes do there's no reason a DSP can't approximate that. For the rest modern systems have much lower distortion (or so i was told!), so if you add tube style distortion to it, you should get close to the real thing. I'm using the kx drivers for my SB Live! and load the TubeSound effect into the dsp now and then. The effect is very subtle but i like it.

I got a 60's tube AM/FM radio, and an older AM one. They may sound tubeish but it's not exactly hi-fi, and it's mono.

That's interesting. Basically the exact opposite of the BBE Maximizer. If that's the case, it could be modeled with a convolver.



My dad's actually a collector of older communications gear, so I have heard lots of AM broadcasts through tube gear over the years. But I never knew exactly what to attribute to the tube sound, and what to attribute to receiver design and audio processing. I've never heard FM though. That might be a little more revealing.

Many vintage audiophiles would argue that Tube Amplfiers have a much "cleaner" sound in terms overall "warmth" they provide for tones. The reality of the situation is solid state stuff usually will always have a lower total harmonic distortion, than a tube. I used to have a tube amplifier that I borrowed from somone, one of the newer ones that was remade by Fender about ten years ago. I am not making any claims about how it sounded subjectively. I will say it was quite vintage watching them warm up in the back. It's definitely enjoyable when it comes to blues guitar ;D. Some would argue that they would add in a second harmonic distortion level, that was just not possible with solid state circuitry making them sound more distinct.

http://www.pcavtech.com/soundcards/techtal...sound/index.htm

Bob Carver made a solid sate amp sound like any tube amp that the folks at Stereophile brought him. Solid state can sound like tubes, the question is just how much distortion do you think you want?