He's upset a few people over the years as he is a little too honest and forthright in the BS loaded world of audio. My kind of guy!
Years ago he had a big kerfuffle with Stereophile magazine when he claimed he could replicate the sound of any amp , regardless of price, in a relatively inexpensive SS amp.
They weren't able to prove him wrong and they held a grudge against him for a long time.
Bob retired but now he's back with a return to his true passion- high power tube amplifiers.
Dick Olsher's review tells it all, nice to read a review written intelligently for a change, by someone who understands how tube amps work.
There's far too many "reviewers" around now who dont have a clue about the technical aspects of amplifier design and how they interact with speakers and other equipment .
One peculiar problem of the internet is that people dont do an "apprenticeship" now- they absorb all the opinions from the forums and web pages , but dont actually do any hard studying or actually get their hands dirty - its all accumulated opinion rather than knowledge and it is sad thing.
I remember in my late 20's having tube audio design books brought up from the bowels of the State Library and the excitement of finding something new and enlightening, in the quest for knowledge.
Anyway, Dick's review of Bob's amp is excellent and highly recommended as a template for aspiring reviewers.
There's nothing new in Bob's design , but he sure has been innovative in bringing some interesting concepts together in this amp.
High plate voltage, pentode operation, negative and positive (current) feedback and the "dc restorer" which controls bias operation at high power.
It's expensive at over $7000 but if I was going to buy a tube amp for myself , this is what I would have.
I'm a little thrilled and a little proud to say that we've been using some of these concepts in the Monduese and Malbec amps for many years now- positive feedback is a big advantage to speaker control , and the bias control we use enables maximum power output with zero crossover distortion. Although I use pentode amps in one of my systems we have persisted with Ultra-linear operation and that has kept maximum power done to around 100 watts, however inspired by Bob I'm going to build some high plate voltage, high power pentode connected amps soon.
Enjoy the music review:
http://www.enjoythemusic.com/superioraudio/equipment/0512/bob_carver_cherry_180_tube_monoblock_amplifier.htm
