PAiA TubeHead

The tubehead is a hybrid tube/solid-state pre-amp, in which the signal passes through 4 basic stages. The first stage is an op-amp, whose output is sent to both the second and third stages. The second stage is a tube run at a low voltage. The third stage combines the output of the first two stages. The final stage is another op-amp.

There are three knobs for each channel. The first knob controls the gain of the second (tube) stage. The second knob controls the ratio of solid state gain vs. tube gain (by changing the combination ratio of the third stage). The third knob controls the gain of the fourth stage.

So, it's very easy to use, and I give it a 10 in this category.

Of course, if you include the fact that you have to build it yourself,
I would probably change the rating to 1 :-)

I use the tubehead mainly on the electric piano patches from my motif rack. When driven lightly, the tubehead produces a wonderfully musical gentle distortion that I haven't been able to duplicate with any digital simulation. I also own a Mark I Rhodes, and the tubehead brings the Motif Rhodes much closer to the real thing than using just the Motif's internal effects. The tubehead is also very quiet, although I get a bit of a hum if I crank the output, so I give it a 9/10 in this category.

For heavy distortion, to my ears the tubehead doesn't really sound any better than the amp simulators in the Motif. But the light distortion is truely something wonderful that fattens up the sound with pleasant harmonics and sounds great in particular on Rhodes and CP-80 (electric
grand).

I have had mine for a number of years with no problems. The pots have held up better than the volume pot on my motif rack, which has become
a bit scratchy.

I didn't have any problems with assembly, and the tubehead worked correctly the first time I plugged it in, so I never needed and support.

I think this is great piece of gear for people that want to add some analog warmth to digital sounds. Obviously, the assembly is a hassle, and I would be interested in hearing from people who have compared the tubehead to other pre-assembled cheap tube pre-amps, such the presonus
blue tube.

very easy, Have the manual but really don't need to read it. Hand assembled by someone I will never know. Has two 12ax7 tubes on two separate channels. It is rackmount unit. Has separate controls for each channel ( drive, output, blend )

First of all there is absoloutly no noise 0! It's takes the place of my compressor, sustain, over drive pedals and to some degree distortion pedals. Although I have noticed every distortion pedal sounds more rich with it. You can hear every string clearly , even when playing chords. It's amzing how it brings any amp to life. You can contour your tube sound. You would need 20 pedals to get the sounds this thing can give you. But it does more then that . It enhances every digital pedal you use. Just turn a few knobs and you have a different effect or enhancement. Best thing I have ever bought for my guitars.

the face plate is a very solid piece of aluminum plate. The enclosure is made of steel. With slots for the tubes to breath. You can see the tubes glow red. I would't drop it, but it's in a rack so thats not happening. Just carry some extra 12ax7 tubes along.

I play everything from classical to blues to metal. Through some old american strats, a Japanese Strat, a les paul studio, and a new 50th anniverary epi les paul custom. I have three amps, a fender blackface concert, a rivera, and Marshall JCM 800 head and a 4x12 cab with greeenbacks. the only other effects pedals now are a boss BF3, boss PH3, Boss DD6, Boss CE5, Boss EQ7, Morely Pro Wah, Tubehead, all going into a BBE 411. I would never sell this Tubehead. It does so much and takes the place of five pedals I had, and does it better!

My Tubehead serves the purpose for which it was intended. However, I cannot understand why they would have used 6 independant potentiometers instead of 3 dual units. The power supply could have been a separate unit with a plug and jack instead of being hard wired.
The manual was quite adequate.

I am only using the device with a home stereo system consisting of mid range audio gear. Not I suspect audiophile quality but definitely a good system.
The Tubehead is very quiet.
The effects as described in the catalogue are definitely there. From a sharp clear transistor sound to a "mellow" or as I would prefer to declare, a somewhat muffled, dull sound. Tube sound?? I have run the thing through my 'scope and found all to be true to frequency response etc.
I am using a Yamaha P-2075, a Mackie (200 watt something or other) tied to a couple of Bose speakers (which sound rather nice), and I've tried the thing on a Technics SU-V650 with mission speakers. The sound in this case comes from a Pioneer DVD player, and a Sony CD player.
When used with the Yamaha and Mission speakers the quality sounds adequate. With the Technics I prefer to leave the thing out of the system. When I use the Tubehead with the Mackie amps and Bose speakers
I must adjust the equalization too much in my opinion to achieve anywhere close to pleasant sound when the input is applied to the tubes.
It is OK but really, not the least impressive.
My choice of music is rather eclectic, I enjoy classical, rock etc. I prefer my CD to be direct to disk.

Could I depend on it? Of course not! The unit I received had phone jacks of such poor quality that the threaded portion broke from the body when tightened. I replace all 4 components.
The potentiometers were not the same size as the holes in the case and the knobs were not nicely lined up with the graduated dials. They were good components but I elected to replace these also with proper pots. I have not tested the unit since this replacement.
The rest of the unit I like. I like the circuit board, the case and the overall design. I think however I may give it to a friend's 15 year old son who may enjoy it more than I.

I think customer support is quite good. I have a Theremax and it seems work very well. I had inadvertantly been shorted a choke coil and I received it within days. No aguements.

I will not use this product. I think it was designed in good faith but the insertion of tubes in the path of well designed solid state gear is probably best left alone.
The quality of some of the components is very poor on my unit. I could replace the tubes, and give it another try I suppose but I think it is working just fine.
I really wanted to try the tube effect as described in the PAIA catalogue, I did, I am dissapointed in this unit.

This was my first diy soldering project, and I fried one of the chips. Maybe if I got another one I'd do a better job. As for use, it is quite easy. Adjust drive, blend, and output. Unfortunately, you have to set the two outputs to different levels to get the same volume. Perhaps this is due to my error when building it. The differences between channels 1 and 2 could also cause phase cancellation, which could be a problem.

I use the Tubehead with my synth studio (at present: Access Virus KB, Waldorf Pulse, Akai Ax-60, Novation Bass Station, Emu ESI-2000). It sounds great. I mainly use it for tube overdrive on my Akai Ax-60. As an overdrive/distortion, it is the best I have ever touched and I couldn't be happier with it. The tubehead is great for adding clarity and warmth to sounds, too. It makes string pads on my Virus shine with beauty, AND it makes them sound more analog. I would like to get another one so I can dedicate one to distortion and one to warming up the whole mix, but then again I wouldn't want to be bothered building it again.

Well, I built it myself as a rookie. I plugged it in, and smoke started coming out of it. Not good. I sent it in for service, and they replaced the chip I fried. Unfortunately, the tech didn't replace some of the screws tightly enough. When I got it home, it worked at first, but then the loose screw managed to get inbetween the circuitboard and the metal case, causing a bridge and frying it again. Paia sent me a new chip and power supply and I repaired it myself, but I would not dream of taking it on the road. However, it works very well in my studio now.

As I said, they fixed it and sent it back kinda fixed, and then sent me replacement parts so I could fix it myself. They didn't charge me the second time around, but I didn't get a discount or refund on the botched repair. The tech was nice, but that doesn't really make it ok.

This box has some ups and downs, with the biggest downer being that you have to build it yourself. I consider myself a musician, not an engineer, and I would rather spend my time playing keys, sequencing, or mixing than soldering chips onto circuit boards. I absolutely live to overdrive this thing with unison leads from my Akai. I don't know how I got by without that killer pair. I think I would like to pick up an ART Tube Preamp System in addition to the Tubehead. Its a slightly more complex tube preamp that would work a little bit better for warming up finished mixed, as phase cancellation is less of a potential problem.

Easy to use. Could be easier to build but is nowhere near as much work as the Fatman. I would gladly pay a few more bucks for a double sided board with plated through holes and maybe for a sorted parts kit. Note that power supply is 12VAC out not 12 volts DC as another reviewer stated.

Gives a wide range of warm tube sounds. You can even run the channels in series of lots of gain. When you turn up the gain, even with only one channel, things can get a little bit noisey. Easy to warm up clean sounds and still have them sound clean if you are careful with the settings. I have mixed feelings about the high gain sounds from this box.

Decently designed but I wouldn't throw it around. For most things if it broke, I would just unplug it and keep playing.

Paia has been ok over the phone and email when I called for Fatman help. I never needed any help with the Tubehead.

It is not the type of box that would make or break my sound at a gig. I think it is more useful in the studio for me.

quality pots, tube drive level,gain and dry/wet mix..seperate for each ch.(unit is stereo-dual 12ax7 pentode tubes)

a fantastic bargain! easy to build kit! performs like manufactured units costing several hundred dollars! Multipurpose! use in home theater/stereo use gives cd's vynl life like sound, with warm presence
and fullness..eliminates the shrill brittleness of cd's..most amazing of all gives fantastic stereo detail and location of all instruments and makes bass full and thumping with sharpness..any recordings using hammond b-3 and other all tube organs be heard as they were meant to be..like wise all overdriven tube guitar amp recordings...THE MUST HAVE SYNTH/KEYBOARD output/effector box! Makes all modern midi digital synths sound like giant old Moog modulars due to the warm analog fullness as described above! best of all has clipping leg to assist in setting the tube drive pots..which at low settings give distortion free analog fullness when cranked up give b-3 tube overdrive to your synth/keyboards or guitar/bass tube overdrive!..totally quiet rugged glitch free operation! I cant praise it enough especially at this price..your pals who have spent twice as much or more for their fancy famous name factory built imitations will hate you!...even if it doesn't please you when used with your keyboards you will still love it with your stereo..runs off a supplied 120vac/12vdc wallwart..so you could i think wire it into your CAR
stereo set up,HA! the best of all of course is to have a total tube stereo-tube preamp (the tubehead) and tube power amps..but this is an excellenc cheap comprimise the tubehead feeding solid state amps..

rugged design kit easy to build the dual 12ax7's should last for 1k hours at least, easy to find these tubes they are still manufactured, matched pairs not needed due to seperate controls (drive ecet ) for each tube..comes with good quality easy cheap to replace 12vdc wall wart..runs cool, cabinet warms only slightly..does not generate any rf/electrical noise..silent operation will be happy in the most crowded rack..all parts common ones easy to find replace..since it is easy to build its easy to repair..gigging no problem

even if youve never built any kit or any paia kit still easy due to excellent clear instructions and simple wiring....any child can learn to solder in 10 mins..take the plunge paia is famous for their generous friendly support of newbies, for allmost 30 years now. a cheap radio shack pencil low wattage soldering iron, needle nose pliers screwdrivers ecet all that required tools you should have around anyway

unlike pro stereo tube preamps this is meant to offer clean distortion free sound to any flavor of classic tube overdrive and does a better job of even several hundred dollar guitar tube overdrive effect tube preamp's due to its unique paia design of running the tubes in "starved plate" mode-at www.paia.com look it up and read the full explanation of tube sound to understand this..no commercial tube effect sold has this genius design, plus its stereo for only $110 now i think..don't overlook paia is now starting their line of high quality modular synth analog modules all at a great value and performance..i have built much of their stuff and allways been delighted and will be building more..im just a happy customer for over 20 years not a paia relative or employee!

2 channels, 3 knobs for each: drive,mix,output. It can't be easier.

You have to build it before ! It's a kit. It takes some time.

I love this unit. I like the tube sound and the tubehead add magic to the cold digital expanders. It does wonder on organs. I use it all the time on the whole mix when I am doing a song. I do electronica music.
It can distord a lot too and will do nicely on guitars.
Distorded sounds are different from digital fx because you still percieve clearly the pitch of the notes. With digital fx, the signal tends to become more noisy and less musical.

Well I see no reason why it will have problems other than there are 2 tubes inside.

PAIA provide support and help to build the kit and can repair it if it's under warranty.

I really love tube sounds. I want more of theses devices. For all kind of music it's a tool to add warmth to an audio track. It can be used as an effect (distortion). If it were stolen I will get another one even if it needs time to build. I am waiting for a 8 tubes/channels preamp by behringer. I hope it will sound nicely too.