Audio power amplifier inside the chassis of the main product. The audio amplifier was invented around 1912 by Lee De Forest, made possible by his invention of the first practical amplifying electrical component, the triode vacuum tube (or "valve" in British English) in 1907. The triode was a three terminal device with a control grid that can modulate the flow of electrons from the filament to the plate. The triode vacuum amplifier was used to make the first AM radio. Early audio power amplifiers were based on vacuum tubes and some of these achieved notably high audio quality (e.g., the Williamson amplifier of
Valve transmitters circuit. This circuit design has been used at 1296 MHz using disk seal triode valves such as the 2C39A. The grid is kept at ground, the drive is applied to the cathode through a capacitor. The heater supply must be isolated with great care from the cathode as unlike the other designs the cathode is not connected to RF ground. The cathode may be at the same DC potential as the grid if a valve such as the 811A (zero bias triode) is used, otherwise the cathode must be positive with respect to the grid to provide proper bias. This