Tubes 101 I got more questions

pjdami

Many thanks again dbnh. You know its great when you can find some advice on something one is about to venture on. Kind of eliminates the "trial and error" approach. Most of the systems I have put together follow on the success of what other people on this forum like to listen to.

After reading your posts on the 5751, I feel like I may be reading my daily future diary and hopefully what I can expect. Some dryness and lack of three dimensionality come to mind as weaknesses in the system I have with the Jolida cdp.

Nice system you have there by the way too. Thanks for the advice and have a great weekend man.

Paul

dbnh

Paul,

No problem, glad to offer what worked for me, and remember, that's what works in my system. Thanks for the comments on the system, I try to stay within my wallet and get as much bang for the buck.

On a side note, I absolutely love what the Walker SST does in my system, including when carefully applied to tube pins, RCAs and RCA connectors, etc. Here's a link to the 6moons review, and there are a number of other reviews out there as well. You can always do a Google search on Walker SST and find the home page, too. (You might want to consider first purchasing/trying some SST, and then see how your current cop of tubes sound before venturing further.) From my experience, and from those in other forums such as AudioCircles, this tweak is the real deal. Mapleshade offers a similar product for about 1/2 the price of SST, but I haven't tried it, albeit I have heard very good things about it.

Peace.

pjdami

Welp, I kinda feel like Kevin Costner in the movie "Waterworld" looking for some NOS 5751s. Except I was looking for tubes and he was looking for fresh water. Both which were very common at one time and respectively rare in their own right many years later. I got outbid on eBay twice today on some "triple mica spacer with either halo or square getters, black plate, etc." Its amazing what NOS tubes will go for these days at over $50 pair or more. This guy Joe on Audio Asylum must be a legend or something because current NOS pricing on these things follows his recommendations based on my first day of research and attempts to purchase.

The Sylvanias...man they are really pricey. Too rich for me for now. The RCAs that I scored according to Joe, outperform any 12AX7 out there...we will see.

I did score some black plate NOS 5751s RCA with the triple mica spacers and halo getter (sounds like a hotrod car terminology or something) and look forward to hearing them compared to the current 12AX7s that I have (including NOS 1961 Sylvanias which have replaced the Brimars as my favorite in the Jolida).

I wonder what all these audiophile tube people are going to do in 10 - 20 years when stocks of these rare NOS tubes dry up?

Tubes, you have got to love them. Leave the rest of the rig alone and just find tubes that you like that match the gear and wire you have.

**edit** for typo:D

organ

Tubes, you have got to love them. Leave the rest of the rig alone and just find tubes that you like that match the gear and wire you have.

Waaaaa I love that:D Much cheaper than upgrading components and it's certainly more fun!

Let us know what you think of the 12AX7 vs 5751. I still think the Sovtek 12AX7LPS is the best sounding. The SED can be just as good with the right combination of tubes farther down in the audio chain.

Maurice

faster100

Maurice,

I have been useing the sovteks all day 12ax7lps's and I do love these tubes the best, i have grove tube mullard remakes, and raytheon 5751's and like the sovteks THEE best so far... Im going to be getting a 5 star GE 6x4 from spaz soon to try... its supposed to be some special GE so well see, I have a regular 60's GE 6x4 black plate in now and it seems to work good.. this pre was used but i dont think much because the more i use it the better its sounding, over the past week or so... not talking warm up time..

its really fun to fool with, I installed some silicone O rings for tube dampers on the 12ax7's today, it came with one on the 6x4 so i have em on all of them, just for kicks

organ

Sweet. Glad you're enjoying them. The dynamics on the LPS is so sweet. Let me know what kind of change you hear with the rectifier. Going from a so so rectifier to a great one is a big improvement.

Maurice