Philips AG9016
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pqrannes
Tubes warm your heart too
Congratulations! If they both are half as good as my ag-9015 you will be very satisfied. But don't read this http://www.tube-classics.de/TC/GermanTubeHifi/Integamps/Philips%209016/AG9016.htm. This guy is very brute about both the ag-9015, the ag-9016 and my little csv-13 Braun tube amp. What is it about him?
Peter Q.
Peter Q.
pqrannes
Tubes warm your heart too
I'll revive this thread since I've found a AG9016 myself. It is indeed a very sweet little amp!
Recently I have mine set up with a pair of full range Philips ("Lz 11", 5 ohm; anyone ever heard of these?) 60's speakers. And the combination is ripping my heart out.
It sounds so good!
Listening to acoustic music (like ol' Leonard Cohen records on vinyl) I'm convinced that this will never sound any better!
Peter Q.
Recently I have mine set up with a pair of full range Philips ("Lz 11", 5 ohm; anyone ever heard of these?) 60's speakers. And the combination is ripping my heart out.
It sounds so good!
Listening to acoustic music (like ol' Leonard Cohen records on vinyl) I'm convinced that this will never sound any better!
Peter Q.
Brian
An Old Geezer
Heard one about a year ago that was for sale and came very close to buying it but at the time was still into the big big system and could not figure out where it would fit in the mix except with possibly my Heresys. They probably would have also worked with the Wharfedales as they seem to prefer lower powered tubes but at the time did not think of it.
audiokit_nl
New Member
tweaking AG9016
I also enjoyed the little amp for a while. I was inspired by other enthousiasts to override the tone control to have a pure sound. I dit this, installed quicker diodes instead of the selenium rectifier, new caps, new connections. Sound improved a lot. I wanted to build 'my own' AG9016 with tube rectifier, and all the tweaks I used in the original. Look at my site www.audiokit.nl to see the results. You can also find a schematic to override the tone control.
Best regards,
Benny
I also enjoyed the little amp for a while. I was inspired by other enthousiasts to override the tone control to have a pure sound. I dit this, installed quicker diodes instead of the selenium rectifier, new caps, new connections. Sound improved a lot. I wanted to build 'my own' AG9016 with tube rectifier, and all the tweaks I used in the original. Look at my site www.audiokit.nl to see the results. You can also find a schematic to override the tone control.
Best regards,
Benny
markus
Master Procrastinator
any pix of the speakers ? I've got some beautiful Isophn 8 X 13's that I'd love to try in something liek that . . .
soundmotor
super modified
His cadence and manner of speaking reminds me of the lead character in the book "Confederacy of Dunces", Ignatius T. Reilly who was constantly fulminating about various people and commenting how "They should be flogged!".
(I rather enjoyed the German author's comments at the site you linked too BTW. Nice to hear something other than the all tubes are great spiel.)
Chrisssssssss
Active Member
I also have one of these little gems. It holds a very special place in my heart for me because it was the first piece of vintage equipment that I ever bought. I was visiting my grandmother when I was about say 14 ish years old and I was tagging along in a thrift store and spotted a little old greyish piece of stereo equipment sitting on the shelf. I wondered over to it as I was always into stereo stuff and kinda peered into the little vent holes in the back and saw tubes. Hmmm, Tubes... I heard that tubes sounded good I thought to myself. I should get this and try it out. I wondered over to my grandma and asked her if she could get this for me. She asked me what it was and I said that it was an old tube stereo amplifier. She Ok'ed the purchase as it was only 50 cents and I think she thought it was a good deal for that price for something that would keep me occupied for a little while.
Well I took the little guy home and of course had to play with it for a bit and see if I could get some sound out of it. Since it did not have regular RCA connectors on the back (has those euro din/flat/funky style connectors) and also strange speaker connections (euro perpendicular blade plug in) so being the boy genius that I was, I took a pair of RCA's and cut the wires and stripped the ends so that I could shove them into the connections on the back for connecting my source to it (I believe it was my walkman) and played with the connections by trial and error on which wire went to which din hole connection, and had a pair of speaker wires hooked up to a raw drivers that were laying around shoved into the speaker output connections. I was able to only get a very very barely audible sound coming out of the speakers, got frustrated with it and benched the unit for many, many years because I had come up with the notion that the tubes were shot and I would leave it for another time.
Well I packed this little guy with me in several moves, once in between trying to get some love from it with the same results, so it sat in a box, still with thoughts of the tubes needing replaced. So fast forward years, one day I was cleaning out my closet, once again getting ready to move and came across this thing again. I thought to myself - I tried to get this thing to work a couple of times, and no luck, it must be pooched, I should just chuck it. So into a pile of "stuff to throw out" it went. So as I took this pile of "stuff to throw out" to the dumpster, this little amp looked me in the face as to say ... Nooooo... I don't wanna go... please... save meeeeee...!!! But I shrugged my shoulders and tossed it into the dumpster along with a pile of other crap to go out anyways with a bit of a thud/crash as I heard it hit the bottom/wall of the relatively empty dumpster. I did cringe a bit...
Later that evening, I could not stop thinking about the poor puppy dog eyes it gave me and actually gave in to my conscience and went back downstairs, climbed into the dumpster and retrieved it. It was not too deep under stuff, as the dumpster was still relatively empty at the time so it was not difficult to snag back, got boxed up and put away once again.
Forward more years, I was looking at that auction site while on the computer one day and saw one of these listed, had a buy it now for $250 with a bunch of pics and a really good write up of how the owner really liked the sound of the amp and it was collectible/sought after, etc... Kinda scratched my head a bit... $250??? For that little amp? $250!!!! Wait a minute... I think I still have that old thing... It's worth $250!! So out to my boxes of crap I went and after much searching, I finally dug it out and looked at it. It's worth $250! Also the guy selling it said that it sounds really good and I am interested in hearing this thing.
So I finally proceeded to look further into the amp to see if I could get some love out of it, and for the first time actually took the cover of this thing fully off (for some reason throughout my previous testing/troubleshooting sessions, I never actually fully took the top right off, mainly because I did not want to break it (especially the tubes) as they were rubbing on the top of the case already and I did not know how to properly take the top off of it (come on guys... those of you that have taken this thing apart... it is a bit tricky like... isn't it??) finally figured out how this thing came apart and looked a bit how the signal path was and figured I was right about the wiring into the source side all along and re-connected everything like I previously did, with still the same very faint output. Looking further into this problem (finally with the lid off of it...), it took me a bit and with a keen eye I realized that when I was sticking the speaker wire into the output slot/holes, I was causing a (+) to (-) short circuit due to the fact that these were not the correct method of wiring/connecting properly, and that the terminal connections were a bit on the loose side, causing a short in the output. Got that fixed up, connected a really good pair of speakers that I had on hand and for the first time got the love out of this little guy that I had longed for. I was a happy camper. This was a great victory for me. I spent a long time playing with this amp and hearing various music through it's "Tubedlyness". I was astonished at the sound, as it was my first ever tube experience.
Well, that's my AG9016 story. I had to fully explain this story because I feel that this one piece of equipment was probably one of the most significant things in my life, as it was my first ever piece of vintage audio, which sparked my vintage audio collecting hobby (and a very, very huge and significant collection it is! Trust me on that...) and to think, it almost never was. But some thing made me keep that guy around and give it one last chance at life, and look what it became. It is my favorite amp that I own, and use it often in the bedroom system where it resides now (Funky connectors removed and replaced with gold RCA's and gold speaker binding posts) still has the same tubes as I got it with (Rogers EL95's and ECC83's) however I do roll many 12ax7's with this amp, but I find that I still always come back to the ol Rogers ECC83's that it came with. They sound the best (I believe they are a Mullard in disguise...)
I wonder what my life would be like today if I would have never found that little amp, or went back into the dumpster that day to rescue it... Hmmmm...
My vintage stereo passion/collection/hobby/obsession/disease I solely attribute to this amp. I actually am listening to it right now as I write this novel to explain why this amp means so much to me and the way my life has gone. I can say that this has been a really significant key item in my life, like in the top 5, maybe higher. I cleaned it up really nice, referbished it back to factory specs, did some modern convenience mods, however it still sits with the small dent and a bit of blue paint scrape/scratch/gouge on the lid right at the back in the center where it hit the dumpster that day many years ago that almost took it to it's doom. I have not tried to punch out the dent or polish out the blue paint scrape (though hardly noticeable) as a reminder of it's almost impending doom, that didn't.
If you are still reading this, you must either really be bored, have nothing better to do, or you were actually interested in my story of the Philips. 100% True story. It has the battle scar to prove it.
The End.
PS, If you are actually wiping a tear from your eye, go hug your stereo, then put on some tunes.
Rock on...
Well I took the little guy home and of course had to play with it for a bit and see if I could get some sound out of it. Since it did not have regular RCA connectors on the back (has those euro din/flat/funky style connectors) and also strange speaker connections (euro perpendicular blade plug in) so being the boy genius that I was, I took a pair of RCA's and cut the wires and stripped the ends so that I could shove them into the connections on the back for connecting my source to it (I believe it was my walkman) and played with the connections by trial and error on which wire went to which din hole connection, and had a pair of speaker wires hooked up to a raw drivers that were laying around shoved into the speaker output connections. I was able to only get a very very barely audible sound coming out of the speakers, got frustrated with it and benched the unit for many, many years because I had come up with the notion that the tubes were shot and I would leave it for another time.
Well I packed this little guy with me in several moves, once in between trying to get some love from it with the same results, so it sat in a box, still with thoughts of the tubes needing replaced. So fast forward years, one day I was cleaning out my closet, once again getting ready to move and came across this thing again. I thought to myself - I tried to get this thing to work a couple of times, and no luck, it must be pooched, I should just chuck it. So into a pile of "stuff to throw out" it went. So as I took this pile of "stuff to throw out" to the dumpster, this little amp looked me in the face as to say ... Nooooo... I don't wanna go... please... save meeeeee...!!! But I shrugged my shoulders and tossed it into the dumpster along with a pile of other crap to go out anyways with a bit of a thud/crash as I heard it hit the bottom/wall of the relatively empty dumpster. I did cringe a bit...
Later that evening, I could not stop thinking about the poor puppy dog eyes it gave me and actually gave in to my conscience and went back downstairs, climbed into the dumpster and retrieved it. It was not too deep under stuff, as the dumpster was still relatively empty at the time so it was not difficult to snag back, got boxed up and put away once again.
Forward more years, I was looking at that auction site while on the computer one day and saw one of these listed, had a buy it now for $250 with a bunch of pics and a really good write up of how the owner really liked the sound of the amp and it was collectible/sought after, etc... Kinda scratched my head a bit... $250??? For that little amp? $250!!!! Wait a minute... I think I still have that old thing... It's worth $250!! So out to my boxes of crap I went and after much searching, I finally dug it out and looked at it. It's worth $250! Also the guy selling it said that it sounds really good and I am interested in hearing this thing.
So I finally proceeded to look further into the amp to see if I could get some love out of it, and for the first time actually took the cover of this thing fully off (for some reason throughout my previous testing/troubleshooting sessions, I never actually fully took the top right off, mainly because I did not want to break it (especially the tubes) as they were rubbing on the top of the case already and I did not know how to properly take the top off of it (come on guys... those of you that have taken this thing apart... it is a bit tricky like... isn't it??) finally figured out how this thing came apart and looked a bit how the signal path was and figured I was right about the wiring into the source side all along and re-connected everything like I previously did, with still the same very faint output. Looking further into this problem (finally with the lid off of it...), it took me a bit and with a keen eye I realized that when I was sticking the speaker wire into the output slot/holes, I was causing a (+) to (-) short circuit due to the fact that these were not the correct method of wiring/connecting properly, and that the terminal connections were a bit on the loose side, causing a short in the output. Got that fixed up, connected a really good pair of speakers that I had on hand and for the first time got the love out of this little guy that I had longed for. I was a happy camper. This was a great victory for me. I spent a long time playing with this amp and hearing various music through it's "Tubedlyness". I was astonished at the sound, as it was my first ever tube experience.
Well, that's my AG9016 story. I had to fully explain this story because I feel that this one piece of equipment was probably one of the most significant things in my life, as it was my first ever piece of vintage audio, which sparked my vintage audio collecting hobby (and a very, very huge and significant collection it is! Trust me on that...) and to think, it almost never was. But some thing made me keep that guy around and give it one last chance at life, and look what it became. It is my favorite amp that I own, and use it often in the bedroom system where it resides now (Funky connectors removed and replaced with gold RCA's and gold speaker binding posts) still has the same tubes as I got it with (Rogers EL95's and ECC83's) however I do roll many 12ax7's with this amp, but I find that I still always come back to the ol Rogers ECC83's that it came with. They sound the best (I believe they are a Mullard in disguise...)
I wonder what my life would be like today if I would have never found that little amp, or went back into the dumpster that day to rescue it... Hmmmm...
My vintage stereo passion/collection/hobby/obsession/disease I solely attribute to this amp. I actually am listening to it right now as I write this novel to explain why this amp means so much to me and the way my life has gone. I can say that this has been a really significant key item in my life, like in the top 5, maybe higher. I cleaned it up really nice, referbished it back to factory specs, did some modern convenience mods, however it still sits with the small dent and a bit of blue paint scrape/scratch/gouge on the lid right at the back in the center where it hit the dumpster that day many years ago that almost took it to it's doom. I have not tried to punch out the dent or polish out the blue paint scrape (though hardly noticeable) as a reminder of it's almost impending doom, that didn't.
If you are still reading this, you must either really be bored, have nothing better to do, or you were actually interested in my story of the Philips. 100% True story. It has the battle scar to prove it.
The End.
PS, If you are actually wiping a tear from your eye, go hug your stereo, then put on some tunes.
Rock on...
Wow Chrissssssss, great write up.
I just got one of these yesterday along with an Electrohome piece. I have no idea what it is, how it works or anything, am afraid to pooch it screwing around. I have none of the connectors necessary to even connect speakers or anything like that.
Still, it may sit for a while, but hopefully it will have a similar effect on my life.
I just got one of these yesterday along with an Electrohome piece. I have no idea what it is, how it works or anything, am afraid to pooch it screwing around. I have none of the connectors necessary to even connect speakers or anything like that.
Still, it may sit for a while, but hopefully it will have a similar effect on my life.
kansei
Super Member
I had one but released it to the wilderness of eBay some time ago. Mine was housed in a weird wooden cabinet, apparently a part of a console. It sounded great to my ears. I bought a Fisher 500b and got rid of the Philips.
I'm buying another if I ever see an original. This thing rocked my bookshelf speakers.
/just noticing that I'm contributing to digging up an old thread. Sorry, folks!
I'm buying another if I ever see an original. This thing rocked my bookshelf speakers.
/just noticing that I'm contributing to digging up an old thread. Sorry, folks!
Pio1980
AK Member
This little guy has an odd number of inverting amp stages which means it probably inverts absolute correct polarity from input to output (unless corrected with swapped polarity at the output sockets). Not necessarily a bad thing as many audiophile amps do that but they tell you it's happening, this one doesnt. Some folk like me are very sensitive to correct/incorrect acoustic polarity and getting it wrong just sounds wrong. Absolute correct polarity is supposed to be industry standard and the ideal model of a 'correct' system is the "tin-can-and and-string telephone" where an acoustic 'push' at the input end results in an acoustic 'push' at the output end. What all that means that I may find the general sound of this amp hooked up to terminal standard poor and simply switching each speaker lead ground-to-high will make a positive improvement depending on polarity of source content of course. That may well be reason for the guy's complaint tho' he should have known why if so. This is not intended to be a hijack or thread crap, just a hopefully helpful observation based on personal experience
Tidied up and recapped, the little Philips should make for a nice smaller-scale/'intimate' system otherwise.
Tidied up and recapped, the little Philips should make for a nice smaller-scale/'intimate' system otherwise.
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Brian
An Old Geezer
Back then the issue of phase inversion was not an issue. It actually seems to have been a hot topic for a short period of time when the reality set in that even if from source to speaker there was no inversion, very few recordings ever paid attention to is so you at best only have about a 50% chance that the phase equals the phase of the original instrument though I've not seen any writings as to whether with acoustic instruments there i such a thing.
If you hear 180 degree phase shift, you make up a very extreme minority. Even back when it was a hot topic and "golden ears" and musicians were being used as test subjects, they admitted if they were right it was only because they happened to guess right. 180 degree phase inversion seems not to be noticeable but if other than it, then it might be (opinion seemed to be split - in some tests listeners were seemingly to having an abnormally high correct rate related to statistical guessing. However, if the final output is other than 180 degrees out without some unit that will adjust to 0 it be impossible to correct.
The little Philips has always caught my eye when I'd see one up for sale. However, from the 1st time I saw one years ago, the selling prices were no bargain. I assumed 2 things from that: 1) the quality had to be rather decent and 2) everyone seemed to know it but me.
If you hear 180 degree phase shift, you make up a very extreme minority. Even back when it was a hot topic and "golden ears" and musicians were being used as test subjects, they admitted if they were right it was only because they happened to guess right. 180 degree phase inversion seems not to be noticeable but if other than it, then it might be (opinion seemed to be split - in some tests listeners were seemingly to having an abnormally high correct rate related to statistical guessing. However, if the final output is other than 180 degrees out without some unit that will adjust to 0 it be impossible to correct.
The little Philips has always caught my eye when I'd see one up for sale. However, from the 1st time I saw one years ago, the selling prices were no bargain. I assumed 2 things from that: 1) the quality had to be rather decent and 2) everyone seemed to know it but me.
Splatter Pak
High-End Scrounger
I bought one of these amps today, at a Habitat for Humanity resale shop - I was there looking for a toilet. I'm looking forward to making it usable in a modern setting...
Pio1980
AK Member
There is the right way and the wrong way to reproduce natural sound in their original energy and waveshape polarity.
There have been instruments available to the audio production folk for years to assure polarity accountability to industry standards. Failure to do so is
either a mistake in production or amateurish carelessness, either or both too common in the industry up thru the digital era.
Web search "acoustic polarity checker".
