From: phil_a@tpg.com.au   
      
   "John Byrns"   
   >   
   >A couple of questions for Mr. Turner, with respect to the Bean Counters   
   >employed   
   > by Acoustical/QUAD back in the days when the QUAD II was being designed.   
      
      
   **  The justifiably very famous QUAD II  power amplifier was designed by   
   Peter Walker in the early 1950s, while the whole UK was still suffering the   
   aftermath of WW2 and in a state of poverty because the country's economy was   
   deeply in debt to the USA.   
      
   Despite this, the QUAD II was built with the highest quality parts available   
   at the time  -  plus 3 superb wound components his firm made specially for   
   the amp.   
      
   Merely to keep production costs within sanity, Peter designed his new amp to   
   use as few components as possible -  unlike most of his competitors.   
      
   He chose GEC KT66s because they were the most linear tubes then available   
   for an audio power amp and EF86s as they were cheap, linear and had plenty   
   of voltage gain.   
      
   He also chose paper in oil filter caps in preference to electrolytics to   
   give the amp a long life.   
      
   The completed amp had exceptionally low THD (circa 0.1%), was internal   
   adjustment free and very stable  -  although the even more famous Quad ESL   
   speaker that would partner it was still years off - as was stereo   
   reproduction.   
      
   The QUAD II  is "penny pinched"  in the just same way that a Shakespeare   
   sonnet is rather short on words.   
      
   While the Turneroid fool is a self obsessed, conceited utter ass.   
      
      
      
      
   ...  Phil   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)