Class D is affordable and sounds as good or better the SS/Valve why buy anything else ?


I have spent a fair amount of my hard earned money on big ticket brand new SS and VT/Valve amplifiers over the years without hesitation, with state of the art 2019 class D amplifiers becoming cheaper and sounding better, i wouldn't join in again.

For older technology amplifiers SS VT/Valve to compete with State of the art class D, Their prices are going up and up.

One example is Pilium Audio from Greece or Bulgaria their Divine Line the prices are all over £100,000 for their pre amps and power amps, I know the UK importer he said they sound OK,

Another example FM Acoustics again up to and over £100,000 for pre and power amps. i have owned FM Acoustics pre and power again their OK,

I am not saying they do not sound good, i am saying why spend this much when state of the art class D probably sounds as good now and can only improve with the GaN capacitors and is nearly up to 100 times cheaper.

Is there still a market for multi thousand £$s SS or VT/Valve amplifiers ?

When class D finally overtakes SS VT/Valves what will people do with their multi thousand £$ amplifiers, keep them knowing there is something better ? Or will we see the market flood with exotic used amplifiers ?

Digital technology is rapidly growing pace and becoming cheaper, with GaN capacitors being introduced the sound is going to get better and better and will slowly or quickly become even more affordable.

If you had 50,000 to spend on an Amplifier, would you buy a high ticket SS amplifier and hope for the best ?

Would you stay safe and go with high ticket valve amp, class D can never match good valves right ?

Or would you sit tight and see how the GaN capacitors can further improve the performance of state of the art class D ?

Please feel free to join in, everybody is welcome, i think its a very delicate/touchy discussion for some people with big bucks invested in older type amplifiers.
townshend-audio
Once again Ric, where did you get a pair of my Purepower SE amps to audition? And if you don’t have pictures it didn’t happen.

And do your board hacks void the Icepower warranty? I can't see how you could hack into the input circuit of that multi layer PCB without making a mess of it. 
@miveraaudio let me explain my question; I have a Ncore 500 (not from Nord) and feed it by a tube pre amp , it has a analog input board but I want to try something more tubi. I got mine 2 years ago and read somewhere those board with this character tend to be dark and no accurate so I stop searching. Recently  I have seen in other post , one manufacturer in USA implemented tubes and I am wondering if It really works or just glowing lamp to attract customers bc as I know there are several layers of filtering in class D that makes it hard to produce warm sound as class A or tube amps.

Mike,

You are starting in with your paranoia thing again. I took my amps to someones house. I don’t lie. I don’t need no stinkin pictures. This is just the first time of many A/Bs versus your amp and many others. Stay tuned for a long ride.

Because you cannot do something does not mean someone else cannot.  I have been listening, tweaking, modifying and manufacturing high end audio for over 40 years.

 
I call BS. Unless you flew across the country, nobody has a pair of my SE amps anywhere near where you live. I could try to hack into the boards and void the warranty as well. But I like Icepower's historical 0.2% failure rate. Besides I've moved onto much better sounding digital input amplifiers. And you don't even need to buy a DAC or preamp!

You're just finally catching up to what was current 1.5 years ago. 
@sthlm78:

I think Colin at Nord can sell you a pair of his input boards. They're an easy swap. With the Rev D boards, you can choose from over 20 discrete opamps that are compatible. Some are very analog sounding. Drawback is if you want to experiment a lot, it will get expensive. If you want a tubey sound try the Sparko's. They're about as tubey sounding as I've ever heard.