There’s a mystique in audiophile circles about tube amplifiers. They can have a very ... but they are often portrayed as requiring rare and expensive components. You don’t need matched gold ...

First made in 1959, this is the best-selling tube amplifier of all time. Every product is carefully selected by our editors.

and even shows off a nice three-tube audio amp using them. The reason transformers were and still are expensive has a lot to do with materials. To build a transformer with enough oomph to run ...