Skip to main content

Tubecore’s Duo warms up your digital media with the glow of vacuum tubes

tubecores duo wireless speaker bring warm glow analog tubes media center tubecore
Here’s a little nugget of knowledge professional  musicians, recording engineers and audiofiles have known for decades: When it comes to amazing sound, nothing beats tubes. Sure, modern technology has lead to amazing advancements in digital amplification, but nothing sounds smoother and richer than tube-based audio gear. Now, a brand-new company out of Maryland is marrying the decidedly analog implement into a modern, wireless speaker that bound in hardwood harmony. Check out the Tubecore Duo.

The Duo started out as a Kickstarter project, and since blowing past its funding goal, it’s seen lots of little improvements and refinements leading up until now. This speaker is crazy customizable: choose between over 30 different speaker grill colors (or use no grill at all), pick your favorite of four different kinds of vacuum tubes, and, finally, pick your computer. Yeah, that’s right: The Duo speaker comes with a computer inside running XBMC, a media center software that lets you browse and play movies and music stored on your network or an external hard drive. Just hook the Duo up to your television and let the magic begin.

Related Videos

Of course, the ability to play movies is fun, but this speaker is designed to sound superb while playing music, and that’s where those tubes come in. The tubes live in the pre-amp stage, so they can smooth out the rough edges of digital music before its sent on to a class A/B amplifier. What that all means is that your music will sound warm, clear and vibrant, no matter what volume you’re playing at. Plus, there’s something hypnotic about the warm glow of a vacuum tube in a dark room filled with your favorite tunes.

The Duo starts at $649, but you can get one for as little as $479 with a pre-order discount at Tubecore’s website right now. Duo speakers are due to ship in June, according to Tubecore.

Editors' Recommendations

Everything You Need to Know About High-Resolution Music
listening music isolation headphones

A few years back, to little fanfare, Neil Young started talking up high resolution music. The folk-rock legend was tired of people listening to low-quality sounds on their laptops, phones, and streaming devices. In his mind and the minds of a lot of other sound buffs, the status quote wasn’t doing the music justice.
Young went so far as to introduce a product, Pono Music, to encapsulate the need for richer sound. The strange contraption, touting a shape not unlike a Toblerone bar, certainly didn’t jump off of the shelves and music fans mostly moved on to other things. The underlying concept, however, remains important and is being revisited by music nerds and product designers alike. And Young is back with a new line of gear, via the folks at Bluesound.

The idea is pretty straightforward. Just as the heavy, 180-gram vinyl record is known to produce richer acoustics, the high-res sound file is believed to offer thicker, more resonant sound. Proponents say it’s exponentially better than what we’ve been accustomed to — the tinny and petite sound waves that pop out of our built-in laptop or mobile phone speakers.
Even when we’re playing larger digital files through iTunes, Spotify, and any number of services, we might not be fully doing the music justice. We may have a fantastic amp and pair of expensive speakers but if the file itself is shrunk down or condensed for quick streaming, you might be listening to what’s essentially a dumbed-down version of your favorite track, sonically speaking.
Enter high-res music. Think of it as having the same effect on The Beatles as a high-def widescreen television does on the movie Avatar. It’s meant to make music feel like it’s being played live in your living room, more robust and enveloping. Now that concerts seem like a thing of the past, at least for the near future, this brand of sound quality is all the more attractive.
A major and relatively new file type high-res music is built around is called the MQA, or Master Quality Authenticated. The most popular streaming service to use such files is likely Tidal, although Amazon and others offer something similar. The technology is still being experimented on but we’ll likely hear more about it in the coming years.
A good way to imagine it is visually, in terms of pixels. High-res music operates at a higher sampling frequency, meaning more signal samples are taken of the music per second than, say, a standard compact disc recording. For comparison, a CD file usually clocks in at 16-bit or 44.1kHz (kilohertz). High-res audio files hover around 24-bit or 192kHz, if not greater.
One of the hangups with high-res music is precisely that — heavy files. We’re talking megabytes here, which can gobble up space on your computer or storage device rather quickly. We are used to having tons of digital clutter as it’s convenient and comforting. But one of the nice things about high-res audio files is they require us to be a bit more selective.
Instead of toting around thousands of compressed albums, we might have to choose a few dozen, depending on file capacity. Audiophiles should liken it to a DJ mentality, digging through record crates for a few of the best to set up that day or week’s mix.
Major streaming services like Apple and Spotify have yet to take the high-res plunge. They may be engaging in research and development or waiting for what they think is a trend to subside. But with more equipment and websites devoted to high-res music, it’s likely that it will only grow in popularity.
Test it out at home by comparing recordings. Go with a sonically rich band like Pink Floyd or a bumping track like Orange Wedge by the Chemical Brothers and see if it’s time to upgrade your home system to high-fidelity standards.

Read more
How to Discover New Music in the Digital Age
how to discover new music person streaming on phone

How to Find the Right New or Vintage Record Player for YouThe world of music is ever-changing. We may reminisce about the days of walking around with our over-the-ear headphones, Walkman, CD player, or MP3 player. Although the days and media have changed, that doesn't mean our love for music and finding new sounds have to follow.

There are at least 1,000 songs uploaded to Spotify, Apple Music, Google Music, and more every hour of the day, according to Hypebot. When you crunch the numbers, that’s approximately 24,000 songs every day and approaching 1 million tracks every six weeks. How does one navigate such a wasteland -- and wonderland -- of audio?

Read more
Time to Flip to Side B: The Cassette Tape is Back
cassette tapes are back tape unraveled

Look out vinyl, the cassette tape is back. Nostalgia is part of the trend but there’s actually more to it than that.
According to Forbes, tapes experienced a relatively staggering 20% sales growth last year alone, putting them ahead of their vinyl counterparts. Since 2011, sales have quadrupled. It’s the kind of boon that puts the lights back on in places like the National Audio Company. There’s even a widely recognized Cassette Store Day (October 12) to celebrate the medium. All told, it’s music to the ears of audiophiles, the tape industry, and cars with dated music systems alike.

Why the rise in popularity? Well, we’re very enamored of the '90s, that’s for certain (does that mean the compact disc is next in line?). Economics plays a big role, too. Tapes are cheaper to produce, while still offering a richness of sound that’s hard to come by in the streaming era. Bands appreciate the low cost, as well as the speedy turnaround time. Pressing a vinyl record, while cool in its own timeless and tangible way, takes an eternity in comparison. A tape can be produced in a matter of days and is easy to pack along and sell on tour.
It’s a very real thing for indie labels like Burger Records in southern California, POST/POP out of London, and more. They’re taking advantage of the industrious nature of the cassette, along with its retro-cool factor. And it’s not just a counterculture move within music. Big-name acts like Jay-Z, Taylor Swift, and Lana Del Rey have released albums in this format.
For older music fans, it’s a way to become reacquainted with something from their formative years. For the younger crowd, it’s simply something new and wondrous, as they didn’t grow up troubleshooting stuck cassettes.

Read more