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Return of the original Miniwatt SET ( APPJ )

captouch said:
You may be thinking of the 3 tube APPJ amp (N3?) that sells for above $200 and uses 2 x 6BQ5's and one 12AX7, IIRC. The one I got is the $136 one that uses 4 tubes: 2 x 6p1p and 2 x 403B. Supposd to be like the original Miniwatt and I *think* a true SET?

Your questions are all good ones though, and I don't know the answers. Just reporting my own thoughts so far based on limited burn in time (if that matters at all) and with a particular set of speakers (Klipsch Fortes), which is really my only high efficiency option. I'd be easy to try them on my A25's as well, but I suspect they won't go very loud with those.

Right, I know the tube type can make a big difference in sound, and right now I have a mix of new/cheap (6p1p that came with the amp) and vintage (WE 403B). Still, I would have thought that the architecture itself (SE) would influence sound quite a bit. Maybe not.

To the extent that tubes 'make' the sound, I can see how spending $2k on a 300B SET amp where the tubes make up a big piece of the cost can account for the delta. What I don't know is what other elements of a $2K amp (besides the tube cost) make a huge difference in resulting sound.

The jury is still out for me. I'm thinking additional tube upgrades will improve things to some degree. I'm always intrigued by the so-called giant killer pieces of gear.
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I appreciate the clarification between the 3 tube and 4 tube MW amps and stand corrected. Thank you.

Were my 'audio ADD' to kick in, I would lean more toward the 4 tube SET version and couple it with a separate tube preamp and a very efficient FR speaker.

Without buying one, I am just offering conjecture so I will either pony up the $$$ and the time or step back and let those who actually have one offer their opinions.
 
Not that I am going to try but I wonder how it would do with the Wharfedale W70s. On my power meter, I use .004 watts at average listening levels with peaks in the .5 watt range. Might be an interesting matchup as the W70s were designed during the tube era and for low powered amps.

They killed for me the need for any amp I owned of more than the 20 watt Sherwood amp. Most have been sold off. I have looked at the chip amps, think that is what you call them but as the Sherwood is fairly small as integrated as go and ss see not reason to get one except to play around. I no longer play in that way, happily.
 
Poultrygeist, good to know about adding a preamp. I can try a CJ PV5 in front of it and see what that does.

Curious, did you ever compare to see whether the 403B's made a bigger difference or the Russian 6p1p's as far as improving the sound?
 
Brian said:
Not that I am going to try but I wonder how it would do with the Wharfedale W70s. On my power meter, I use .004 watts at average listening levels with peaks in the .5 watt range. Might be an interesting matchup as the W70s were designed during the tube era and for low powered amps.

They killed for me the need for any amp I owned of more than the 20 watt Sherwood amp. Most have been sold off. I have looked at the chip amps, think that is what you call them but as the Sherwood is fairly small as integrated as go and ss see not reason to get one except to play around. I no longer play in that way, happily.
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I have 300B, 845 and 6BQ5 SE amps. What I have found is that the sensitivity of the speaker coupled with the complexity of the overall load (crossover plus driver) is a good indicator of success. The simpler, the better.

Hence single full range and efficient drivers usually work the best.

I don't know how complex the W70's crossover is so am not able to offer an opinion. The only thing to do is try one and see.
 
TubeHiFiNut said:
I have 300B, 845 and 6BQ5 SE amps. What I have found is that the sensitivity of the speaker coupled with the complexity of the overall load (crossover plus driver) is a good indicator of success. The simpler, the better.

Hence single full range and efficient drivers usually work the best.

I don't know how complex the W70's crossover is so am not able to offer an opinion. The only thing to do is try one and see.
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Very simple. A single inductor, a single cap, and a pot. The woofer runs wide open. As basic as one can get on a 3-way system.
 
Brian said:
Very simple. A single inductor, a single cap, and a pot. The woofer runs wide open. As basic as one can get on a 3-way system.
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You know...this may actually work. Found the attached spec sheet and noticed that the minimum power is stated at 8 watts IHF.
 

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captouch said:
Poultrygeist, good to know about adding a preamp. I can try a CJ PV5 in front of it and see what that does.

Curious, did you ever compare to see whether the 403B's made a bigger difference or the Russian 6p1p's as far as improving the sound?
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The Western Electric 403B's along with the Russian 6p1p-ev's are the cat's meow. Huge improvement with those tubes. The ev's are the rugged military spec version.

Some of the MIG's electronics used those tubes.

When the original MW was being sold online this combination was the recommended tube upgrade.
 
ferninando said:
Even that little TPA3116 blows it away IMO.
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This caught my eye. My speakers are Klipsch Kornerhorns. I have a Sure tpa3116 amp already and thought about getting one of these SET amps. The Sure sounds good, but not much bass. Also, it has some speaker popping issues that are annoying on power on/off. Should I get one of the SETs to compare? Or would it be a waste of time?

I also have a McIntosh preamp mx113 but when paired to the Sure, there is a lot of hiss. Would I have the same problem with the pre and one of these SET amps? Sorry for the derailment just trying to decide where to spend money - one of these amps or trying an RCA attenuator in current Mc / sure set up.
 
onlysleeping said:
This caught my eye. My speakers are Klipsch Kornerhorns. I have a Sure tpa3116 amp already and thought about getting one of these SET amps. The Sure sounds good, but not much bass. Also, it has some speaker popping issues that are annoying on power on/off. Should I get one of the SETs to compare? Or would it be a waste of time?

I also have a McIntosh preamp mx113 but when paired to the Sure, there is a lot of hiss. Would I have the same problem with the pre and one of these SET amps? Sorry for the derailment just trying to decide where to spend money - one of these amps or trying an RCA attenuator in current Mc / sure set up.
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The Miniwatt didn't work for me with my Fortes. I wanted to like it, but it just didn't do it for me sonically. I did try the WE 403B tube upgrade, but didn't have the patience to wait for the Svetlana tubes to replace the 2nd pair.

I also tried to use my CJ PV5 as a preamp into the Miniwatt, but that didn't significantly improve SQ for my setup.

With the tube upgrades, the Miniwatt runs about $185-190 or so. It's not like the $30-45 TPA3116, where it's kind of trivial $. FWIW, I think the TPA3116 is great value for the $, and have no complaints about the sound of that.

When you get near the $200 mark, you have other options. Console pulls, tube integrated amps that fly under the radar, etc.

If you buy it off Amazon, you can return it if you don't like it. So there's not a lot of risk. But it seems like the Miniwatt may require a more specific type of setup (full range drivers?) to get to its sweet spot.
 
I've never been much of a Klipsch fan and for the most part I've used the MW with FR single drivers speakers. Even the Zu's run full range with a simple cap on the tweeter while the Frugal Horns, Betsy OB's and Tekton 4.5 have no crossover.

The MW shines with these speakers as the lack of a crossover allows the micro detail to come through. No need to get into a SET/full range single driver discussion as the phenomenon is so well documented.
 
so if I get a set of Caintuck's OBs my MW should be happy?
It's now happy on my Tekton lore 2.0s. To me anyway.
 
ferninando said:
so if I get a set of Caintuck's OBs my MW should be happy?
It's now happy on my Tekton lore 2.0s. To me anyway.
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I have no experience with those open baffles but I wouldn't be surprised if you prefer them over the Lores. My first OB's sounded better than my Zu Omens.

I think Randy uses a simple first order crossover and at 96dbs they should sing with just a couple of watts.

The MW will not sound it's best unless all four of those lousy Chinese tubes are rolled. And then the replacement tubes will need some break-in.
 
the replacement tubes are on order in transit.
the tektons are 96db also.
hard to think anything can best my Lore's. they are my shining stars
of my sound system.
 
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