Tube Compression VS Transistor Clipping for preamp dirt into a PA.

[Revan]

(Post deleted)

Edited because I've come to the conclusion that transistor clipping sounds fine in the preamp and is used in many famous dirt pedals and even the preamp of a JCM800, in conclusion if anyone cares to explain why this is the case, as opposed to the poweramp that would be appreciated.


Peace.

[nosaj]

(Post deleted)

Edited because I've come to the conclusion that transistor clipping sounds fine in the preamp and is used in many famous dirt pedals and even the preamp of a JCM800, in conclusion if anyone cares to explain why this is the case, as opposed to the poweramp that would be appreciated.


Peace.

We cannot tell you what you like and why...that is a determination for you. Me i love a nasty tweed deluxe cranked with the touch sensitivity.

nosaj

[g1]

Not sure exactly what you are asking, but power amp clipping requires high volumes, and lots of people want to be able to get a similar sound at lower volumes. So preamp clipping with a master volume gets you distortion without having to drive the power amp to full output.

[Revan]

We cannot tell you what you like and why...that is a determination for you. Me i love a nasty tweed deluxe cranked with the touch sensitivity.

nosaj

Not sure exactly what you are asking, but power amp clipping requires high volumes, and lots of people want to be able to get a similar sound at lower volumes. So preamp clipping with a master volume gets you distortion without having to drive the power amp to full output.

How come "nasty" solid state clipping is okay if it's in the preamp? - that is my question.


I shall elaborate, yes power amp clipping requires a high master volume therefore (in the case of tubes) making the power tubes compress the signal to create a good overdrive sound, now think of the same idea but with a solid state poweramp and the clipping sounds fairly harsh/bad, this is the widely accepted consensus that I also find true in my individual experiences.


SO tube power amps are fine to run into clipping for guitar-ish tones but never run a solid state poweramp into clipping,


Now let's talk about preamps, why is it that guitarists use solid state transistor generated overdrive pedals using jfet's and opamps, diodes etc to clip the wave and these pedals don't sound bad and are in fact widely used and accepted? - often times through both tube and solid state power amps that are at low volume and not clipping in the poweramp therefore only hearing the preamp overdrive tones.

[eschertron]

How come "nasty" solid state clipping is okay if it's in the preamp? - that is my question.


I shall elaborate, yes power amp clipping requires a high master volume therefore (in the case of tubes) making the power tubes compress the signal to create a good overdrive sound, now think of the same idea but with a solid state poweramp and the clipping sounds fairly harsh/bad, this is the widely accepted consensus that I also find true in my individual experiences.


SO tube power amps are fine to run into clipping for guitar-ish tones but never run a solid state poweramp into clipping,


Now let's talk about preamps, why is it that guitarists use solid state transistor generated overdrive pedals using jfet's and opamps, diodes etc to clip the wave and these pedals don't sound bad and are in fact widely used and accepted? - often times through both tube and solid state power amps that are at low volume and not clipping in the poweramp therefore only hearing the preamp overdrive tones.

filter (verb)

filter (signal processing)

[alexradium]

Clipping is clipping, whatever the device you use .
Pedals today sound ok because the distorted sound is filtered with several low pass.
But,there are things you can't easily replicate,like grid clipping,bias shifting, crossover distortion artifacts and the much bigger voltage of tubes.
A good pedal with a low volume tube amp still sounds one dimensional,it's either full distortion or not.

[loudthud]

SO tube power amps are fine to run into clipping for guitar-ish tones but never run a solid state poweramp into clipping,

Welcome to the forum.

Symmetrical clipping is the enemy of good tone. It sounds hollow. See this thread: https://music-electronics-forum.com/...ad.php?t=48223

[nickb]

Welcome to the forum.

Symmetrical clipping is the enemy of good tone. It sounds hollow. See this thread: https://music-electronics-forum.com/...ad.php?t=48223

Another hotly debated subject, for sure. Read MEF Thread

[HaroldBrooks]

It's hard to make a fair qualitative analysis of someone else's likes or dislikes, and Nosaj stated, but I will just add a portion of my opinion to the mix. I much prefer tube amp distortion through and through for the majority of what I play, and If I was left with only one "Sound" from distortion, it would be a distorted tube preamp and PI section, followed by a lightly distorted tube output, with either a SS rectifier or a tube one (depending on the amp).

Now that being said, I use a Boss DS-1 in my act for a couple of lead solos and the one Nirvana tune we do. It sounds better using that solid state distortion into a tube amp... For those songs only, and I can't imagine using just a tube amp, it would sound inferior for some songs.

Here's an example of a really ROUGH tube amp sound that I absolutely love from Jimmy Page starting at 3:30

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4JhldliZoLg

He is purported to be using an old Valco amp on the early albums, but he may also be using some type of geranium fuzz box up front, it's impossible to determine exactly, and he will never say, but there it is.

But either way, the sound is magnificent... For that song... and perhaps only IMHO... only for that song. If I had to live with that rough a distortion on everything I did with my cover band, it would sound horrible, particularly with chords like an E7#9 - https://www.pinterest.com/pin/300474606365333307/

or some other 7th, minor, or suspended chords that appear in about 25% if what we play. The correct artistic expression and tone depends on what you are playing, and how close you want to either match, or contrast.

So truly, the quality of distortion is in the ear of the beholder. Were I draw the line is in comparisons between modeling and many of the vintage amps they attempt to copy. They still have a way to go to crack that code, and maybe never unless they open up there minds to the complexities and take a very holistic and entire system driven approach to the problem.

[olddawg]

The classic rig from the 80s was a ProCo Rat into an older JCM 800. A Rat by itself into a clean amp is a bit brittle for most people.. but it’s all subjective. The JCM 900s have clipping diodes in the front end. There’s more than one way to Egypt. There are hundreds of OD and distortion pedals out there... even tube ones. All application specific.

[nosaj]

The classic rig from the 80s was a ProCo Rat into an older JCM 800. A Rat by itself into a clean amp is a bit brittle for most people.. but it’s all subjective. The JCM 900s have clipping diodes in the front end. There’s more than one way to Egypt. There are hundreds of OD and distortion pedals out there... even tube ones. All application specific.

I liked the Rat into a Bass amp effect.
nosaj

[Chuck H]

Something neglected so far is how either device, tube or transistor, respond to the voltage supply within their working environment. IMHO the actual clipping difference between the two isn't that significant when used as voltage amplifiers. Power tubes are a different matter and all bets are off once you start clipping power tubes vs. power transistors. So this observation applies to preamps only. Which (I think) addresses Revan's question. Transistors just sort of do what they do within comparably narrow operating parameters. Always sounding pretty much the same. Tubes on the other hand change in response over a wider range of their operating voltages. I think this is what players are actually hearing when they say that transistors clip harder and tubes clip softer. Which is a misstatement at best and hogwash in reality as it applies to preamps. So the devil is in the details. Tube amp voltages are high and as a consequence of the components required to achieve these higher voltages their operating voltages shift a greater percentage of their operating parameters. This is very audible as well as being something even green players can "feel" as a dynamic response to the signal from their guitar. But... Once you reach hard preamp clipping if you don't have the voltage shifts relative to power supply sag then the two devices sound and feel disgustingly similar. This is one of the reasons tube preamps and tube pedals don't get the job done like a tube "amp". Same goes for those amps that include a tube in the preamp of an otherwise SS amp and advertise that they're giving you "tube tone". It's BS. It's my opinion that tube amps sound significantly different because they're operating within more dynamic voltage supply circumstances than transistors when trying to amplify. Tube "compression" as it were. And these dynamics do A LOT of interesting things that you'll never hear in a transistor amp unless it's designed to emulate this characteristic. And none that are seem to do it well enough. Unfortunately it's not as simple as designing sag into a transistor amps power supply because transistors simply don't have the operational leeway in their function that tubes have. But, remove the dynamic voltage circumstances and you remove most of the difference between tubes and transistors. That's my point.

Now, power tubes... Not what the OP was asking about, but, this is a whole different kettle of fish. I'll just say that everything that I mentioned about voltage dynamics is exponentially increased as well as there being other distortions caused by the difference in how they're coupled to a load. And the only thing that sounds and behaves like clipping power tubes is clipping power tubes. (<period) Beyond that I'll leave it to others to dispute, expand on or further explain what I've (tried to) briefly cover here in laymans terms.

[ric]

The only "mix" I have to cut thru is a recording or the radio, so this may have no relevance to anyone...

Trying to find a good sounding amp was an expensive game I couldn't afford, so was glad to find the Line 6 Pod. Playing thru headphones just isn't the whole deal though, so I sent it out thru a salvaged Magnavox tube amp. EL84s for each channel and a PP EL84 pr for bass is how the amp works. So overdriving the tubes may be part of the equation, but I felt it sounded good and with the d#mb!e model the response was what I liked.

Well, all I had to do now was find one of these d#mb!e amps.... And so began my build-a-tube-guitar-amp-out-of-salvaged-parts-hobby.

[Leo_Gnardo]

The only "mix" I have to cut thru is a recording or the radio, so this may have no relevance to anyone...

Trying to find a good sounding amp was an expensive game I couldn't afford, so was glad to find the Line 6 Pod. Playing thru headphones just isn't the whole deal though, so I sent it out thru a salvaged Magnavox tube amp. EL84s for each channel and a PP EL84 pr for bass is how the amp works. So overdriving the tubes may be part of the equation, but I felt it sounded good and with the dumble model the response was what I liked.

Well, all I had to do now was find one of these dumble amps.... And so began my build-a-tube-guitar-amp-out-of-salvaged-parts-hobby.

So you went the extra yard, lots of 'em actually, maybe some better speakers than what's in Line 6 combos too, points on for that.

[alexradium]

https://youtu.be/GAEdc1l-t6g