SpeakerTalk

[Richard12345]

Hi, I am new to this forum, so I may be asking in the wrong forum etc.

many years ago, I decided to learn a bit of electric guitar,
I went to a showroom in Bristol at the Mickleburgh's shop, in those days they had the electric guitar stuff in the basement,

they had many guitar amplifiers at different prices and no idea what the deal was regarding functionality versus quality versus price and asked the salesman.

he said he could demonstrate some

so I pointed at one, and he connected up an electric guitar and played a short segment of music,
it was good quality sound.

then I pointed at another one, and he connected up the guitar and played another short segment of music,
this time I was completely mesmerised, the sound was absolutely sublime, it sounded like an adept guitar solo of some rock band

I didnt know you could get that quality of sound at home.

so I asked why was the second one so much better?

He said because the first one was solid state, ie based on transistors, but the second one was a valve amp.
He said the valve amps have to be run from the mains, so buskers usually use solid state ones as you can power
them with a few small batteries.

In the years since then, the shop has restructured the layout a lot, and I am not sure they do such demos any more, the nearby PMT shop allows customers to try out the gear but I am not sure if they do valve amps.
I did learn some electric guitar with a cheap Maplins guitar and a solid state Roland Cube Street, I decided to start off cheap
in order to learn what the issues were before buying something high quality.

I only learnt to a very basic level, because its a big investment of time to learn.

Anyway, that got me thinking over the years about whether I could use a valve amp for my hifi, not just to be retro
but to get more sublime sound. Only recently I found that these have existed for decades.

At the moment I have a Rogers A75 Series 2 amp that I bought second hand in 1985,
with that as an arbitrary benchmark, because no point buying something worse quality sound,

Question 1: I was wondering whether there are valve amps which outdo that?

Question 2: if yes, is there a demarcation point in time when there would be ones which outdo it?

Question 3: also, are valve amps still made?

when I looked on the internet, its not clear if valve amps are second hand.

More specifically, I have seen a valve amp called a Rogers Cadet 3 integrated valve amplifier,
by the same manufacturer as my current amp, but said to be probably from some 50 years ago.

Question 4: Would that Rogers Cadet 3 valve amp be any good in terms of sound quality?

its quite expensive, so I dont know if that is because its an antiquity or because of the quality

older is not necessarily better, and its not necessarily worse, eg my analogue kit from 1985 beats most current systems hands down.

I am not concerned about really high volume, as I live in a terrace where it would be antisocial to play music extremely loudly,
it just needs to be loud enough that I can hear it from the next room with all intervening doors open.

One last question:

Question 5: Can a guitar amp be used for hifi?

(ie to buy a quality valve guitar amp, and somehow connect my hifi to it.
The Roland Cube street has all kinds of electronic sound effects built in)