AOpen Debuts The Funniest Motherboard Ever

Anonymous Coward X-11 writes "Has AOpen gone flipping nuts by putting vacuum tubes on its motherboards? AX4B-533Tube No, it's not replacing logic ICs with discrete components. The tubes are part of the on board audio. Not sure if they are serious about this. April 1 was two months ago." As an owner of a tube headphone amplifier I applaud AOpen's move to accomodate the high-end audio enthusiast, while simultaneous wondering about the ability of a switched psu to properly drive a tube amplification stage cleanly. There's no way this is for real, right? Right? Here's a link that seems to work pretty well. And this looks pretty, well, real. Update: /. reader Jedi1USA noted that HardOCP has more pics of the board.

Comments

My dad says...

[ColGraff]

My dad claims that some people like the sound of vacuum tube amps, so maybe this isn't nuts. But how do they deal with unfortunate tendency of vacuum tubes to burn out?

Re:My dad says...

[Russ Steffen]

Yeah, but tubes don't automatically mean better sound. Junk is junk with tubes or without. There are plenty of tube amps that sound like crap.

Re:My dad says...

[Anonymous Coward]

Classical concerts are not electronically amplified. That's ridiculous.

Re:My dad says...

[ninewands]

Quoth the poster:

It's common knowledge with audiophiles and professional musicians that vacuum tubes are better than solid state technologies at reproducing sound.

It's common knowledge (among audio engineers, because MOST "audiophiles and professional musicians" don't understand the electronics involved) that a vacuum tube power amplifier operated in a push-pull configuration and biased for Class A operation produces less distortion than the designs commonly used for solid-state power amps. HOWEVER, a solid-state PA operating under the same conditions will produce just as clean an output and waste just as much power and generate as much, if not MORE heat.

That being said, I read the tech specs on the board and find it a woefully inadequate attempt to cash in on the "coolness factor" alleged to apply to tube amps for audio.

The tube on the mobo is a dual triode. Since it's being fronted by a stereo sound circuit, push-pull design is out of the question. It's just a straight-up dual-channel, single-ended power amplifier. This coupled with the fact that (IIRC) most multi-section tubes are directly-heated (the filament IS the cathode instead of just a heat source), indicate that improvement in perceived audio quality will be minimal at best.

Without seeing the schematic for the amp, I can't give an opinion about it's stability, but triodes tend to be fairly susceptible to parasitic oscillations if they are operated at more than moderate power gain without HEAVY bypassing. This hefty use of capacitive filtering is what gives tube amps their reputation for "warmer sound". The fact is that a lot of the higher frequencies are bled off by the bypass capacitors.

Class A amps typically have a plate efficiency of 35 percent or less. This, coupled with the existence of the tube's filament (heater, for the Brits among us) indicate that the tube is going to produce PRODIGIOUS amounts of heat for a minimal improvement (if any) in true audio quality.

In short, I see it as a "gimmick" mobo.

Re:My dad says...

[JabberWokky]

But it's not-so-common knowledge that solid state technologies can reproduce the exact same sound as tube amps. In fact, digital equipment can reproduce any sound with any quality distinguishable to human ears.

I'm on the whole "solid state is good for music" wavelength with you, but guitar amps are kinda a special case - they are designed to be driven past the "normal" limits, and it's that breakdown in fidelity that a tube provides (and which is unique to each variant of tube) that you're after. Sure you can model the whole thing, but at a certain point, getting the sound right when you're laying down a strong bass with harsh pops with your thumb while going up and down the high treble hammering and sliding... well, it really just is easier to use an "analog" devide like a tube. It's the subilty of the extremes that tubes get right - or rather, they get it wrong, and that's what's wanted. And to 99.9% of people who listen to the music, it makes no difference whatso*ever*. But, when you're performing, you can hear the difference between your fingernails at one length and 1/16th of an inch longer, and for a musician, it's all about the tiny little details. Hell, I play almost entirely acoustic nowadays, and I like listening to the sound slowly alter in the morning in the woods as the humidity changes as the sun burns off the fog and dew. Does that mean that I care? Hell no... I just *notice* - that's what musicians do when they play. Each musician cares about different things... some *really* care about their amp sound. More power to them.

You can hear all sorts of things in high fidelity headphones while listening to Zeppelin or the Beatles - talking off to the side, older demo tracks, etc. They were never *intended* to be played on high quality speakers with a recording as good as the master. (And if you're listening _solely_ for those little things, you're doing what someone up above pointed out - audiophiles listen to noise, not music) Kinda like how SciFi props for TV shows look like painted crap in real life - they are intended to be shown on a really fuzzy NTSC or PAL screen. Fidelity is great to a point - movie soundtracks are much more clean than most albums simply because they *know* they are going to be played in a digital theater, whereas albums are (usually) meant to be enjoyed for the music.

Let the musicians be anal about the sound - it's your job to get laid with the music going on in the background, or blare it while driving down main street with your buddies singing along, or sob into your beer about how that guy on the jukebox is singing about how she left you, or otherwise just make part of your life. I've spent my time in darkness in a comfy chair, eyes closed, listening to good headphones... the goal is still the same: Enjoy your music.

--
Evan "First got laid to Grateful Dead, was listening to the Brandenburgs when I found out about 9-11, listening to Crowded House, Kill Eye right now".

who are they kidding?

[hifizen]

As an audiophile and electrical engineer, I can tell you that no serious music (tech) lover will take this seriously. It's common knowledge amongst audiophiles that high quality audio can only be reproduced outside the electrically noisy environment inside a PC case. But more than that, audiophiles are a particular, fussy lot, and they all have their own preferences for this tube type or that.

Who are you kidding, AOpen? Leave the high-end audio to the specialists, and leave it off your mobo!

Websurfing done right! StumbleUpon

Re:who are they kidding?

[Jucius Maximus]

"As an audiophile and electrical engineer, I can tell you that no serious music (tech) lover will take this seriously. It's common knowledge amongst audiophiles that high quality audio can only be reproduced outside the electrically noisy environment inside a PC case."

True, and PCs themselves are acoustically noisy as well. What's the point of super high fidelity sound reproduction when you've got hard drives, dvdroms and fans whirring in the background?

Re:who are they kidding?

[optikSmoke]

I can tell you that no serious music (tech) lover will take this seriously.

Though I am not too knowledgeable in the particulars of audio/music tech, I gather from your comments and others that this board is not geared towards people who actually know anything about sound, but rather those overabundant people who believe to their core they know everything about it, and don't..... I happen to know one or two. Blaargggh

What kind of tubes?

[cporter]

The important question is, what kind of tube is it? There's only one, judging by the picture. Is it an output tube? Another question: cooling. Tubes get damn hot.

A lot of audiophile tubes are sourced from Russian or Chinese factories. It would suck to blow the tube playing GTA3 and have to wait 12 weeks for a shipment from the far east!

What exactly will this tube be doing?

[handsomepete]

I'm honestly asking. Would a single tube of that size after digital processing really have a major effect on sound quality? I thought the neat thing about tubes were the warmth and natural distortion they provide (in the same way as analog recording). If it has already gone through digital processing with the inherently less forgiving limits and peaks, wouldn't that actually hurt the quality? And what's the deal with that power input near the tube?

This whole thing seems kinda skimpy on details... I hope this doesn't give Creative any ideas. The last thing we need is a PCI SB Live card with this stuff on it:
This quality Creative Sound Blaster(tm) product requires the space of four PCI slots and a special attachment for your power supply.

Re:Why your dad says that...

[Shelled]

Dual tubes aren't rare, and they are usually small (proper term: receiving tubes, probably from the original use in radios.)

Ding Ding Ding....

[Silver222]

We have a winner!

The most common argument the tube lovers trot out is that the best guitar amps use them. They seem to forget that when you are listening to music, you want something that accurately reproduces the sound on your source, you don't want something that changes the source.

"Audiophiles", flame away.

Re:Ding Ding Ding....

[scumm]

I'm not a semi-serious guitar players, I'm a pretty overly serious guitar player, and these guys are almost entirely correct.

Since the late 70's (for the most part - some have never bothered to change) venues have tended to use solid state amplification for sound reinforcement, for the reasons listed above - more efficient power consumption, more reliable, etc.

For guitars, tube amps just sound better. Digital modelling, etc., all try to REPRODUCE the sound of a tube amps, not best it. That's fairly telling. The reasons tube amps sound better for guitars are varied, but are mostly centered around overdriving the amp. The distortion comes on very smoothly as you roll the volume up, and responds to dynamics much better.

For home stereo? Some of the best audiophile home stereos I've heard have been tube (mid 70's Marantz gear), and some have been transistor (late 70's Marantz gear). But tube amps are just NOT cost effective anymore, and almost all of the supposed advantages are just audiophile snobbery.

Another problem with current tube amps is the downright sorry state of tubes. You have to search REALLY hard to find a really high quality 6L6, 12AX7, or EL34 nowadays, and those are the most common used in amplifiers. Hell, the only place to find really high quality ones, like Mullards or Telefunkens I've found is eBay. And they're expensive.

Remember, audiophiles don't listen to music, they listen to noise, and therefore souldn't be taken seriously.

Re:Pictures

[n6mod]

For the less tube savvy out there, that means it is a preamp that can drive six channels.

Uhh, no. It's a dual triode. That means it has two sections each of which have three electrodes. Those three electrodes are Plate, Grid, and Cathode, which map roughly to Emitter, Base, and Collector. (I think...it's been a while) Actually, I suppose Source, Gate, and Drain are more appropriate, this being a GloFET.

In any case, there are two devices, not six, so you get two channels, not six. In fact, I'm pretty sure the 6DJ8 was designed for balanced operation, not stereo. For the less tube savvy out there, that means it was designed for one channel, not two.