My first Tube Headphone Amp

[Tony3d]

Hi all, Well good news and bad. The good news is I got the VAl E10 Tube headphone amp a day early. The bad news is I think something is wrong with it. It plays fine for about 30 minutes or so then the music cuts out and I get a buzz in both channels. I have removed the tube and seated it 4 times. Same thing. It sounds fine till buzz kicks in and the music stops playing. Any idea's?

 

[tubesaregood]

Try a new tube? Does the plate of the tube glow red at all?

 

[Seth=L]

Try a new tube? Does the plate of the tube glow red at all?

Uh, oh, looks like you will have to change your username.

 

[tubesaregood]

Nope, solid state equipment goes bad too. It's immediately worse for the system as a whole when a transistor fails anyway.

 

[markw]

Any idea's?

Hi all, Well good news and bad. The good news is I got the VAl E10 Tube headphone amp a day early. The bad news is I think something is wrong with it. It plays fine for about 30 minutes or so then the music cuts out and I get a buzz in both channels. I have removed the tube and seated it 4 times. Same thing. It sounds fine till buzz kicks in and the music stops playing. Any idea's?

Yeah, send it back and get another one. It's broken. There's no way a NIB item should ever act this way.

I'm actually surprised this didn't occur to you already.

 

[tubesaregood]

I would definitely try a new tube(s) first. More likely the tube is bad than the amp itself, although it's still pretty bad if they sent out an amp with a f-ed tube.

 

[Tony3d]

Thanks guys. The seller does think it's the tube, and is sending me two new ones. If at that point it turns out to be something else, he will send a new unit.

 

[audiofox]

Nope, solid state equipment goes bad too. It's immediately worse for the system as a whole when a transistor fails anyway.

True; however, solid state devices have significantly longer MTTF rates (we're talking orders of magnitude) than almost any tube device (with the possible exception of TWTAs used for power amps in high frequency comm systems), which is one of the down sides of owning tube audio electronics. Having said that, I view the reduced tube life as more of an opportunity for tweaking, similar to a turntable cartridge replacement. The trick is finding a tube equal to or better than the one that failed, since tube performance is more variable than SS devices as well.