Why are tube amps so expensive?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Greg_L
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It's noon somewhere . . .

It's really just a state of mind I have achieved; very, very mellow, and delusional to the point that pretty much every chick (say under 60) always looks attractive.
 
You know what sucks? Under Dave Barry's rule that men may be legitimately attracted to chicks who are the older of 18 or four years older than their oldest daughter, well later this year my cutoff will be 19 :(
 
I'm in a similar but different situation. I'm in a perpetually hungover state of mind and I hate everyone.
 
:D I don't really get hangovers but my stomach/esophagus is pretty much shot so . . . :(
 
Back in the 60-s when I was a kid you could go into any drugstore in the country and find a big tube-tester machine with a cabinet full of all types of tubes. Because every radio and TV needed new ones all the time. Dad's spent their Saturdays trying to save dollars keeping the TVs going. You could also find Heathkit stores in almost every major city where you could get kits to BUILD your own TVs and electronic projects, most of which contained tubes.

From the 1970s on, it's all 'dixie-cup technology'; cheap IC make stuff cheap enough to throw away.
yep ..... even convenience stores had 'em.

I remember popping into a drugstore we were passing to grab a freesh set of 6550's for my bass amp on the way to a gig. Tubes were everywhere!
 
Tubes being used in everything is before my time, but I do vaguely recall looking into the back of old tv's as a kid and seeing the tube glowing back there. My grandma still calls the TV "the tube".

"Turn on the tube. Gregory, the tube is too loud!" I'm like, "look mawmaw, TV's don't have tubes anymore".
 
You know, I went into Walgreens the other day and they didn't any of those disposable flashbulbs for my 110 camera, so I sat right down on the carpeted floor in the photo section and bawled like a little baby, until the cops came :( Getting tazed hurts, but not as much as the good ol' days when they'd beat you with their nightsticks. Especially if it was Heather Locklear giving you the beating :( They don't even carry nightsticks anymore :( :(
 
I just got rid of my last CRT TV. It was a Sony HD from 2005, and it had a better picture than any of my plasma or LCD's.
 
I have five computers all with LCDs, and of course the kids have ten zillion iPods etc., but only one TV and it's a 12 year old CRT. I never watch TV and I don't get to play Xbox much anymore, so I don't really care.
 
In my Youtube tribute to "Unforgiveable", I have a line I use on a GC salesman who shows me a Mesa with "vacuum tubes":

"Punk, I don't vacuum nothin', that's what I have a wifey for. That thing looks like the back of my grandma's television. Now go plug me into one of those amps with the iPod dock in it!" :D
 
You know what sucks? Under Dave Barry's rule that men may be legitimately attracted to chicks who are the older of 18 or four years older than their oldest daughter, well later this year my cutoff will be 19 :(

How's that work if you don't have any daughters, just sons? Substitute "daughter in law" for daughter? Sure hope not; my son married a woman older than him, that would seriously limit my choices...
 
How's that work if you don't have any daughters, just sons? Substitute "daughter in law" for daughter? Sure hope not; my son married a woman older than him, that would seriously limit my choices...
you can be "attracted" to anyone.
You just can't act on it.
 
Then you're good to go with 18, whereas that would make me a sicko. Also, wifey would get pretty mad :o
 
How you gettin on with the new amp?

It's wonderful. I'm liking it a lot. Got it tuned up with new tubes and a bias job and they repaired a few caps and fixed some squirrely wiring that had been done before, so she's singing sweet Marshall goodness.
 
It's wonderful. I'm liking it a lot. Got it tuned up with new tubes and a bias job and they repaired a few caps and fixed some squirrely wiring that had been done before, so she's singing sweet Marshall goodness.

What'd you stick in it, JJ's?

Is it a 50 watt combo or a head?
 
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