[pinnahertz]

Transducers can affect the transient dynamics.

Relative to an actual compressor they do nothing.

 

[pinnahertz]

Transducers can affect the transient dynamics.

Not if operated within design parameters where they are behaving more or less linearly. If you're referring to "Power Compression", (more correctly "thermal distortion")where the voice coil heats up enough to present a higher impedance and lower efficiency, then sure, but that's operation out of the safe design range. And the result is still nothing like the degree of gain change that a compressor produces, though it's time constants are similar to a fast acting RMS compressor.

 

[bigshot]

Anything operating within its limits is not going to have an effect. But speakers are real world mechanical devices, and in the real world limits are exceeded on a regular basis. Just look at the government.

 

[pinnahertz]

Anything operating within its limits is not going to have an effect. But speakers are real world mechanical devices, and in the real world limits are exceeded on a regular basis. Just look at the government.

Agreed. Government speakers operate outside their limits all the time.

 

[Soundsgoodtome]

Please take this in pure fun and not to poke at anyone but... this is what happens when you answer a digital question with analog answers. LOL

Many say tube sound is nothing more than EQ and designer coloration, if this is the case would it be possible to exactly replicate tube sound through the use of a plugin?

I guess by plug-in you mean some thing for a replay program such as iTunes.

I often think that people pursuing a valve sound ("tube sound" in US) might do better buying a valve buffer rather than a valve amplifier. The reason I say this is that you can just unplug the valve buffer and return to the non valve sound, which I think will be a bit of a relief when you get fed up with it.

Here is a valve buffer, or tube buffer:

http://www.destiny-audio.com/cms/en/pre-amplifier/tube-buffer.html

It is a "plug-in" but maybe not the kind you were discussing

 

[ev13wt]

My Samsung S8 has a tube sound plugin. So theres that.

 

[pinnahertz]

My Samsung S8 has a tube sound plugin. So theres that.

You mean they couldn't get a real tube in that thing? Wimps. I heard it gets hot, though...

 

[Ynot1]

Just my newb observation. Linear part of tubes can be replicated by plugin reasonable well. But in saturation where the gold is in music via tubes at least for electric guitar, plugin still has work to do. My marshall modeling amp is good, but it's no mesa rectifier with a half stack. They say tube output stage is visceral.


S8 sells like hotcakes. But Apple always beats them so Apple is hotter.

 

[pinnahertz]

Just my newb observation. Linear part of tubes can be replicated by plugin reasonable well. But in saturation where the gold is in music via tubes at least for electric guitar, plugin still has work to do. My marshall modeling amp is good, but it's no mesa rectifier with a half stack. They say tube output stage is visceral.


S8 sells like hotcakes. But Apple always beats them so Apple is hotter.

If the linear part of the amp is…um…linear, there is no model required.

I believe we've established that tube amp modeling for instrument amps is a very different issue. There's no reason it couldn't be dead-on, but would likely be very specific to that particular device. And don't forget, when you use a Marshall model played through some other amp, it won't matter much how good the model is if played through something that does it's own modifications to it.

 

[Ynot1]

Ok. But I still think tubes are an art vs science. Like saying someone has perfect speech, and you look at the voice spectral response and say
perfect nothing, looks noisy to me. Just having fun.

 

[pinnahertz]

Ok. But I still think tubes are an art vs science. Like saying someone has perfect speech, and you look at the voice spectral response and say
perfect nothing, looks noisy to me. Just having fun.

I disagree. Tube sound is science to a point mixed with a heaping helping of expectation bias.

 

[Soundsgoodtome]

Tell you what guys, can't wait until my Schiit Freya gets back to me from repair (it's en route back from Schiit as we speak). The sound of my system to speakers and headphones just sounds so much more lively and rich with tubes vs all SS my system is without it.

 

[bigshot]

Equalizing would likely make just about any amp you use sound better. That's more important than tubes vs solid state. I'm sure all your amps can sound good with the proper response curve.

 

[gregorio]

Just my newb observation. Linear part of tubes can be replicated by plugin reasonable well. But in saturation where the gold is in music via tubes at least for electric guitar, plugin still has work to do.

It doesn't matter whether it was built by art, science, the hand of god or whether the response is linear or non-linear, it has a transfer function/s and can in theory be modelled. For example, I'll quote again from the publicity I linked to before:

"The Digidesign team also emulated aspects of amps and cabinets that are frequently overlooked in other modeling units, like power amp sag and speaker cone breakup. “There are some classic guitar tones that come from speaker cone breakup,” explains Townsend. “With a guitar speaker, you’re feeding a wide bandwidth signal through a 12-inch speaker, and different parts of the cone move differently. One part might be moving out while another is moving in. That happens all the time, even at low volumes. When you drive the speaker hard, those cone breakup modes change non-linearly. It becomes a chaotic system, and the result is part of each cabinet’s unique tone.” The cone breakup model proved to be one of the toughest aspects of the project for Townsend. “Once we understood how a speaker actually works, we came up with a model to try to emulate that chaos,” he says. “But we also used our ears as the guides, always making sure the final result was musical, not just mathematical.” http://akmedia.digidesign.com/news/docs/Behind_Eleven_42323.pdf
http://akmedia.digidesign.com/news/docs/Behind_Eleven_42323.pdf
I'm not saying they necessarily achieved an absolutely perfect emulation but the software/hardware is popular with a lot of actual guitarists.

G

 

[Haris Javed]

In short, yes it can, but honestly you want to avoid this.

To understand why its bad, you will need an oscilloscope, and what happens to your signal when it is processed via plugins. Again In short signal is compressed / amplitude is changed which introduces distortion, and clipping when amplifier gain is applied to it. It is better to just buy a midfi tube amp (200-500 usd range) or a tube preamp instead of plugins. In my personal experience plugins tend to make the signal too hot so it easily clips and distorts when amplified - but who knows maybe other people have had better luck.