The Tube Maze

[Ewan Scott]

Hi, New to this site and looking for advice. First a quick system description, my preference is vinyl, I use a Townshend Rock / Excalibur and a couple of different cartridges. I use Quicksilver Audio V4's and an old Quicksilver Full Function Pre, I like this equipment, it is extremely musical, speakers are Celestion A3 floorstanders. I am now looking to start tweaking my Quicksilvers, and the first place I was going to start was with the valves, therein lies my problem. There are planty of types of 12AX7, 12AU7 & 12FQ7 vales around by various manufacturers, so I am looking to find out what other peoples recommendations for manufacturers of these types of tube. Someone will have trodden this path before, so I would appreciate it if you could pass on some of your knowledge.

[azazello]

Telefunken ECC83- long plate, CV4004/ECC83/. Both are low noise! They are equiv. to 12AX7. Price is aprox. 50 - 80 $.

[thebulbguy]

Telefunkens are great; I have also had great experiences with some of the NOS American made tubes. If you can find a couple different types for cheap to mess with it might be worth it. Some of my favorite 12AU7s are the RCA clear tops-they not only look cool (getters on the sides) but sound awesome. They are also quite affordable.

[Gladiator33]

Telefunken 12AX7, RCA Clear Top 12AU7 and RCA Clear Top 12FQ7! The best combo!

[radiostar]

I have tested many 12AX7 / 12AU7 and some of my favorites are:

12AU7 Telefunken and ECC802s Telefunken
E82CC Siemens triple mica

12AX7 Siemens ECC83
12AX7 Telefunken and ECC803s Telefunken

[Eli Duttman]

NOS can be very nice, but (for the most part) the good stuff is either gone or expensive.

For phono section 12AX7s, the current production Sovtek 12AX7LPS is hard to beat. It's clean, quiet, and about $10 per tube.

AFAIK, 12FQ7s are NOS only. For 12AU7s, I don't trust current production. Think about RCA 5963s and E. German RFTs. If the heater PSU has some extra current, using 12BH7s instead of 12AU7s may be possible. The 12AU7/ECC82 has linearity issues.

[kstagger]

American 12AX7s aren't quite in demand like the Mullard/Telefunken stuff. But I still like 'em. RCA/Raytheon/Sylvania/CBS come to mind. If you want to try some new stuff - the Shuguang 12AX7 isn't half-bad - perhaps a little dark sounding, but an added palette if your system is on the bright side. The JJs are surprisingly even-handed too.

Same for 12AU7s - the black plate RCA 12AU7 is one of the 'best' of this not-so-great tube.

Of course tube-rolling is highly subjective, so again, just my two cents.

[radiostar]

East German RFT 12AU7 ECC82 are very good value for price ...