• WARNING: Tube/Valve amplifiers use potentially LETHAL HIGH VOLTAGES.
    Building, troubleshooting and testing of these amplifiers should only be
    performed by someone who is thoroughly familiar with
    the safety precautions around high voltages.

Just ordered a Korg EMX-1

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I don't really know much about tubes at all, but it has 2 x 12AX/ECC83 type tubes in...

I was wondering if any of you guys here would know if either of the tubes were to go, would I be able to just put in any 12AX type tube in or does it have to be the exact same brand and model number?
 
Well I got this unit 2nd hand, it's only 1 month old, but the tubes are warrantied for 3, so no worries right now really...

I'm just not really sure how long tubes last, as I've never owned any gear with tubes before, but by the sounds if it they'll last a long time.

I've searched on ebay for "12AX7 ECC83" and quite a few different brands came up (mostly used but lots of matched pairs tho), so by the sounds of it any of them would work, but I'm not going to order any until the old ones go (if they ever do).

One more question, with tube gear, if I was to use it intermittently throughout the day, is it better to turn it on and leave it on as opposed to turning it on and off lots of times?
 
The less you use the tube the longer it last's.

You can check out some place like tubedepot.com for 12ax7's.


It looks like they range anywhere from 10 us dollars a piece to 300 and change for high end matched pairs.


So you have lots of options.

And yes those tube should have a very long life but I wouldn't know exact numbers but I would imagine years if it's intermittent use. That is if you aren't using it for every single day for hours.


Nick
 
@ Mikehunt

Due to stabilty my synths, under many different at that time, f.ex JP-8's and Moogs but specially the Sequential Circuits Pro-One and Arp's where "on" day and night until the Tracks got recorded. I would say that every equipment has it's own working time/temperature due to overall stability of tone in the recording. I think that the price of the tubes for a musician will not matter, nor if it's matched or specially inside of a synth. Balance and all tone controls of the synth get them matched as well at the end. As a source of tones you should not think about maching. Only the listener of the finished product should maybee do. BTW: The Knobs of your EMX-1 remind me to Rolands TB-303 606 ... :)
Go on and put in some 12AX7 like the Mullard, Phillips, Ei and throw out the chinese ones ... The synthesizers allways need to match together among themselves not the tubes ;-)
 
Well if these 2 tubes are for the vco's then ya I would suppose you don't need to match them. But I would because if there's a huge difference in the mu of the tubes it could create quite a big difference in the to vco's output level gradients.


But some high end tube would probable be a lot closer match off the show room floor them some cheap chinese ones which are in there, they would last longer too I would imagine.

Just my 2 cents though,

Nick
 
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