Ultimate Tone books by Kevin O'Connor

[kwad]

I'm thinking about purchasing these books, but holy crap they're expensive.

If you have these books or have read them what are your opinions on the content of the books?

Why are they so expensive!?

[tubesornothing]

There is a lot of info in there and have used them a lot.  Everything from theory to the practical.  Somewhat disorganized, I found that I needed to write my own index to favorite topics.  Lots of tips from power supplies, preamp, power stages, filters, effects, power control, etc. etc.  KoC is online at Powerscaling.com, so will answer questions if need be.

Worth it?  Hard to say - they are expensive.  In hind sight, since I am fine with theory and math, I would rather have Merlin's new book ($32) and then get various practical/historical stuff from Gar Gillies book (from Garnet Amps - $60).

[nastyoldtech]

TUT3 is pretty good. The first two are ok. Out of the whole lot I would probably just get TUT3 if I were to do it over again. Gar's book is up there in my top favorites. I would also look into the Radiotron 3rd Ed., I also have the 4th but I like the 3rd better and I'm always cracking that one open. There's a pdf of the whole 4th ed somewhere in dark cyberspace. If you like hard copy pick up the 3rd and get the 4th in pdf.
That new Merlin book looks like it will be a go-to in the future. I would pick that one up and get TUT3 down the road.

[jhadhar65]

Here's my 2 cents:

I haven't read everybody's book yet, but I have read Doug's (no, not the dirt track book - the Tube Amp Library of Information) and I've read quite a few other 'Bibles'.  I'll say that the other Bibles generally fall into two broad categories:  The Very Complicated and The Very Opinionated.

The Very Complicated variety includes RDH (yes, 3 is easier to digest than 4) and any other professional manual of the era.  There's no better data anywhere - if I could just understand it.

The Very Opinionated variety includes nearly everything written since 1980 except for a very few.  There is no "Ultimate" anything...

... except for Doug Hoffman, Richard Kuehnel, Earles McCaul, Paul Reid, and Steve Luckey.  If you think Reid and Luckey haven't written a book, you haven't seen the huge archive I have of their stuff.  I'm also favorably anticipating Merlin's book.  I highly respect all of those guys and I unashamedly hang on every word they say.  I am a better circuit builder, trouble shooter, and general amp guy as a result of teaching by those men.  ...and yeah, I'll argue with them.  How else can I test my own purely theoretical ideas?  I have to make the most of the time I have while they'll still talk to me.

In the end, when I gotta get it done and I need to know the best way right now - which might be 2am - I hunt the answer down in Doug Hoffman's notes.  I've totally adopted his layout style and philosophy.  I haven't ran into a single situation where his advice or method has let me down - not one.  For me, the Tube Amp Library of Information is by far the most dogeared, worn out, over read book I "own".  One day, I plan to convert the whole thing to pdf, index it, and print it off so I can read it on the can!

[tubesornothing]

Well, time for me to go through the library of info again!

[darkbluemurder]

I own the complete TUT series. Here's my 2 cents:

Vol. 1: very good general info, info on modifying Fenders and Marshalls, reverb and switching circuits
Vol. 2: good info on power supplies and power amps
Vol. 3: very good info on build construction and build projects
Vol. 4: IMHO the most opinionated and most difficult to digest. Lots of master volume, attentuators and power scaling
Vol. 5: very nice build projects
Vol. 6: looks a bit like a compilation of stuff that wasn't fitted into the other volumes. I like the High Gain chapter even though the proof reading appears to have been sloppy - the Marshall SLX text does not fit the SLX schem and the Carvin Legacy lead channel schem is also incomplete.

If there ever is a second edition of these books I wished the contents would be rearranged in a more logical order. Nevertheless I feel the money is well spent.

Cheers Stephan

[nastyoldtech]

One day, I plan to convert the whole thing to pdf, index it, and print it off so I can read it on the can!

When you do, send a copy my way. I might as well live in the can. 

[PRR]

> holy crap they're expensive.

When was the last time you bought a College Textbook?

No, they are not priced like beach-reading books. It takes a LOT of work to put technical words together; and making good illustrations is frustrating. Some of those volumes may be half-year projects; what is a year of your life worth? Then the market is VERY small. Maybe not even a hundred copies the first year, possibly under a thousand copies even after years of steady pushing. Traditional publishing is heavy set-up costs, and stupidly expensive for total first-year sales under 5,000 copies, so KoC apparently pays a per-sheet price at the copy-store.

$70 average (in the 6-set) is not a high price for GOOD information. IMHO.

[LooseChange]

The TUT series of books are great.  There's tonnes of information in those books.  More than I'll ever need. My favorites are 3 and 5 but TUT (1) is essential. I built the "Standard" in TUT5 and that was worth the cost of the book.

[Champ_49]

I have TUT3.

Initially I thought it was a bit of a hard read.  I really wanted to apply the galactic grounding popularized bt Kevin but it was difficult for me to understand. As I am still new to amp building.  You have to be familiar I feel with terminology and things like that. 
I ended up contacting Kevin directly for some layman's advice and he is I gotta say a real cool guy. He explained to me in detail so I can actually apply the concepts in the book.
After talking with him and looking back at the book I could understand more of what he was talking about. 
I ended up applying the galactic ground to my jcm800 amp which initially had some issues.  I went full out with it. And even went to splitting V1 and V2 as well as power end of the amp each having their own filter cap as dyscussed in the book.

I have to say that afyer applying those things the amp turned out great! It made a huge difference actually in terms of the tone and feel of the amp and I am really happy with the results from the application of his book.

I'd really recommend it and once you understand it it's definitely worth it.

I'd say that amp is the best one I've built so far. And Kevin is a really good guy.  And lastly he really knows his stuff.  He knows what he's talking about.

[MakerDP]

I'm a fan of his books too. I have 2, 3 and 5. Someday I will get the rest. I've also found him to be a pretty good guy. I've never talked to him but I have exchanged some emails with him in the past.

His London Power Standard from TUT5 is one of my "bucket list" amps. I think I am going to build it in two parts... first the power section with power scaling as a stand-alone power amp then the preamp also as a stand-alone. I will put the reverb and effects loop in the power amp so that I don't have to include them in every preamp I build going forward.

[Champ_49]

Yes. He's a really cool guy.
I am also planning on getting his other books once I fully understand TUT3.

I've had some people say his opinions are a bit biased. But all in all his methods worked out well for me.
the jcm800 is the best build I've done so far.

[MakerDP]

He kind of got a reputation as being rather abrasive when he frequented forums back in the day. He has some ideas that are not conventional and his defense of them rubbed some people the wrong way. He also takes credit for a lot of stuff as being his own ideas and while I have no idea about the truth of that, there are people who don't like the fact he does that.

I really like the format of TUT3... taking existing favorite amps and explaining their shortcomings and then presenting how to improve their design.

[Champ_49]

I have to say that was a big reason I was hesitant to try the methods he improved on. I didn't understand it fully at the time in terms of practicality but one thing I could see was it was yes unconventional.   Which was why I was hesitant.

But it makes sense that improving tired old methods is the way to go.I'm glad I took the small jump. Although I think some people like to do things the way it has always been done the whole time I'd have to say that modern methods why not If it improved upon older designs.  I haven't really done a lot yet but the results of some of his "unconventional" methods worked out really well for mE so far.

Also thinking back and I'm sure it's been mentioned in the book. But the reality is amps built by big companies and I'd say even some boutique builders are made to be economical which could mean  that some shortcuts to save costs are there.  I agree with what it says in the book that we have time on our side to improve on the amp using more modern methods but without cutting corners to be economical.  Because it is our own amp and we don't have to worry about jacking up the cost of the amp to the buyer because the only buyer is you. In reality I feel that if you are able to build an amp there is great potential for you to build a really really good amp. Standung up to or even surpassing the big players
that's if you take the time to build it the best way without worrying about costs to the buyer.

[pepoportilla]

Do somebody could get this PDFs?

[sluckey]

Do somebody could get this PDFs?

You can probably find them on the seedy side of the net. Don't forget your PPE!