I’ll agree that a lot of the distorted, harsh systems in townie clubs with no bass are worse than a well designed and set-up dance rig, but when you’re on about the Valve banging out >120dBA into your ears it ain’t gonna do them much good (my ears were ringing for a couple of days after even tho I was wearing plugs that night).

Thats because your a cheeseweasel. I wore the plugs i was fine no different to a night out at fabric.

@citizen 463104 wrote:

Thats because your a cheeseweasel.

Touché.

@cheeseweasel 430087 wrote:

I doubt it – I think it’s quite difficult to engineer them for high power PA applications. I know Dillinja’s label is called Valve so I guess it was named after that (or is it the other way round?).

a lot of drum and bass producers use them in the mixing desks/pre-amps. Most modern PA’s (and also radio transmitters) use MOSFETS which are not that much unlike valves in their electrical characteristics. I think valves are still used in some very high power radio transmitters. I did recently unearth info on the actual Phliips 2kvA valve amp so it was possible but not exactly trivial.

Mind you (having grown up at the tail end of the valve era, they were still used in some hi fi until the mid 1970s and in operational use in kit used in schools into the 1980s) so seeing EL84s being used just as mid stage drivers in a power amp was impressive :wink:.

There are some truly silly switchmode amplifiers around at the moment, such as this one that can do 30,000W @4R in a 1U rack case! And they weigh next to nothing.