Valve amplifier thermionic valves. The simplest valve was invented by John Ambrose Fleming while working for the Marconi Company in London in 1904 and named the diode, as it had two electrodes. The diode conducted electricity in one direction only and was used as a radio detector and a rectifier. In 1906 Lee De Forest added a third electrode and invented the first electronic amplifying device, the triode, which he named the "Audion". This additional "control grid" modulates the current that flows between cathode and anode. The relationship between current flow and plate and grid voltage is often represented as a series
Valve audio amplifier technical specification it is referred to as the "phase inverter") to drive the power section. As an alternate to the long-tail pair, the "concertina" uses a single triode as a variable resistance within a potential divider formed by Ra and Rk either side of the valve. The result is that the voltage at the anode swings exactly and opposite to the voltage at the cathode, giving a perfectly balanced phase split. the disadvantage of this stage (cf the differential long-tail pair) is that it does not give any gain. Using a double triode (typically octal or noval) to form a SET input