Old TVs, early supercomputers, and modern fancy sound equipment all use vacuum tubes. But why? What does a vacuum tube do?
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Perhaps part of your question is “why use vacuum tubes when there is and has been a more reliable alternative”? If so, I can tell you as a card carrying audiophile that there is a belief held by many serious audio aficionados (myself included) that vacuum tubes portray the music that plays through them as more relaxed, melodic or inviting than music played back through a modern transistor based amplifier. Perhaps some of it is simply the beautiful lighted glow a nice 300B amplifier tube portrays, but we also know that the type of distortion (minimal) that a vacuum tube creates sounds more natural or pleasing to the human ear. Could a transistor produce the same or more power far more efficiently and reliably? Absolutely. But for the same reason some people enjoy taking 10 minutes in the morning to make pour over coffee when they could just press the button on the Keurig, some people enjoy the ceremony of using vacuum tubes.
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