Should Class A Amps be left on??

Personally, I have had Plinius SA-100 mk3 amps, and I would not leave them on in Class A idle. First they suck up electricity. Second, the hotter the temperature of an amp, the less lifespan it has. Temperature affects amplifiers like everything else, it decreases the lifespan of the amp.

KF

Both tube and solid state amps can reach a stable operating temperature in about 15 minutes. I see no reason to leave the amp on when no one is listening just to save the warmup time. The electricity alone is enough to justify this. Didn't your parents teach you to turn off the light when you leave a room? Same goes here (and probably multiplied by a small factor if your amps are like mine: BAT VK-60). Just a few years ago we were all worried about using up the earth's resources. Whatever happened to that?

If you want to speed up the warmup process, just put a space heater under the amp. Then you only need to wait five minutes.

Hehehe, John, doesn't space heater use electricity? ;-)

We in California get our electricity from hamster power, and it is very expensive. :-)

Turn the Class A stuff off... It's not like we need heaters ;-)

KF

I keep my solid state amps on 24/7 unless I am going out of town. The soundstage really opens up after they have been on about an hour. I turn off my tube pre-amp between sessions. It seems to warm up fairly quickly, plus I don't want to burn up my NOS tube set.

If you notice a difference and don't want to wait then leave them on all the time. If you have heat/power concerns or ocassional listening habits, then you may want to switch them on in advance of your session.

Be aware that warm up can also be significant when auditioning new equipment.

On a side note, I have 22 Bryston amps at my work that have been on for 10 years straight without failure.

hope this helps,

Stewart