At your risk. All safety precautions such be followed for any voltage or current. A suitable fuse should always be used too.
When an output trasformer is used max efficiency of a class A amplifier is 50%. Of course class A amplifiers (electrons flowing all the time) will sound louder than other classes of operation [Hamm]. Even an amplifier of less than 1 Watt output can sound great and loud, be it transistor or electron tube see previous posts.
Efficiency must also take into account cathode heater energy.
If very low noise, simplicity etc, battery operation is desired efficiency is very important (a suitable fuse should always be used in series with a battery for safety). For such low power amplifiers a great percentage of power waste is on heaters. For example if using a WE417A it may be around 2W. But if a direct heated electron tube is used such as DL94 it is only 1.4V at 100mA ie 140mW.
How would a triode connected DL94 sound like?
A one transistor amplifier would be even more effect as no heater power is required.
Reference:
Tubes vs Transistors (vs op amps), Is there an audible difference? - Russel O. Hamm - JAES
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