Slight Rant- No More NOS Tubes

Here are the pics, bought and tested from a reputable dealer in Europe. I like the sound but they are a little edgy and less smooth than my best 12AX7s.

 

Tubes can age. The first thing I would be concerned with is why a tube went bad in the first place. Tubes have an indefinite lifespan. I would look to capacitors, resistors, etc. I've got some tube-type equipment dating back to the 1930's with original tubes. Different brands or production dates of tubes may produce different effects. That is why there are so many 6L6 tubes available. Tubes like these, used in a push-pull circuits, should always be used as matched pairs. On tubes which might be microphonic or produce other unwanted emissions should have grounded shields covering them. I wouldn't consider Amperex as a great tube, but that's just me.

 

If the tubes have seams on top of glass they are Matsushita. Some audiophiles like these tubes. I prefer RCA 12AX7 black plate. The RCA vary from system to system, but in my tube stereo they are very open, detailed without being aggressive and are ultra clear sounding.

 

They look like Matsushita tubes to me, the angled o getter is very peculiar and unique to them.

 

my power tube (kt120) basically had an intermittent open circuit so I bought a new quad. they were 2-1/2 years old so they were about due by all reports.
the 12au7 amperex was highly microphonic and it might have been so since i received it because i never checked (lesson learned).
what small signal tubes do you like?

 

For vintage U.S. tubes, I lean toward those branded GE, RCA, Sylvania, Raytheon, Tung Sol, etc. Years ago, I bought some NOS Amperex 6973 's, which are usually used in matched pairs. In a stereo amp I wanted to put them in, which required 4. The genuine 6973 tubes are known for their bright purple glow, but one of these tubes glowed so brightly I thought it was going to catch on fire. I pulled it and plugged it into one of my tube testers and the meter reading was off the scale! I was using them in a 1959 Wurlitzer jukebox and had just re-capped the amp. Luckily, one of the original Wurlitzer 6973 tubes tested good and in the same range as the 3 remaining Amperex tubes. The Wurlitzer-branded 6973 was probably original and had a 1959 date code on it. Gosh, that was almost 20 years ago! The Amperex tubes lasted a couple of years and I replaced them with NOS GE 6973 tubes. The Wurlitzer tube still tested fine and was in range with the 3 GE tubes. Well, they are still working great.
Amperex was the North American division of Philips. Come to think of it, at one time a decade ago, most of the incandescent lights you found in big box stores was Philips branded. They didn't last long either.
I also seem to remember in late-80's into 1990's atleast Jaguar cars used Philips branded lights. Because of their sensitive light-out indicator system, you had to replace the light bulbs with the same brand and rating or it would turn on the failure indicator. Getting tired of replacing one Philips bulb one week and having to replace another the next week, I talked the customer into replacing all the bulbs at once. I used Osram(Bosch) light bulbs and never had to replace another one for years, and that was due to a rock breaking the bulb.
I've also had good luck with Sovtek and Electro-Harmonix. I've heard good things about Grove Tubes. Check in with a guitar store and see what is the most popular. Those tube-type guitar amps are cherished.
If you have a tube go out and it was not physically damaged you may need to re-cap your amp.

 

A little more complicated than that. Amperex was a independent company that was acquired by Philips in the mid '50s. Manufacture of tubes for sale as Amperex continued both in the company's Long Island, NY plant, which Philips invested in, and in various Philips locations around the world included the Heerlen, Holland, factory. Heerlen-made tubes are justifiable sought after and tend to run a long time.

Plenty of great, long lasting tubes made by Philips and by companies Philips owned. I mean in 1927, Philips acquired Mullard. All those much sought after Mullard EL34s and 12ax7s were made under Philips ownership

Corporate ownership by Philips is hardly a marker of low quality, poorly manufactured tubes.

 

I have a pair of Made In USA NOS JAN Philips 6SN7, does this may mean they were made by Amperex? The lettering on the tubes is green which I've been told this mean that they were made in the 80's. Do you think these are good tubes for Audio? I've been told they're iron cast and use to last a loooong time.

 

And it still doesn't change my personal experience with Amperex. Philips-branded tubes are indeed quality tubes, but no more Amperex tubes for me. Philips probably used Amperex as their bargain line.
Philips, like many world giants, invested in many different areas. Philips used Mercury Records in the U.S. for it's recordings released in the U.S., long before acquiring it. With Mercury's styrene pressings of Philips releases, they weren't as good as Philip's own European vinyl pressings. Philips also used Mercury to introduce it's compact cassette line. Ever heard of the Norelco shaver? That's Philips too and the company is still going strong.
I never meant to say Philips was a bad company, but just like any other company, they have their failures, like the Philips-branded lighting products.

 

I remember back in the bad old days of rec.audio.tubes, it was a running joke that every factory that made bad vacuum tubes was converted into a Phillips light bulb factory.

 

I live in Spain and even on the early 90's we all knew that Philips' glory days were long gone, that by the early 90's Philips was a bit hit and miss. At the time when one was on the market looking for a new TV set Sony, Hitachi, Toshiba were the brands that the mid European were looking for for price, quality and reliability, Thomson, Grundig and Telefunken were phasing out and Philips were for elderly that were looking for a brand they were familiar with. It's like if today we'd compared and iPhone with a Nokia cell phone. All this happened in Europe around 25 years ago.

 

I always assumed that CEI tubes were all re-labels; am I correct in that? I have a really nice pair of Amperex made 5842's labeled and boxed as CEI.

 

I'd never heard that before, but that's pretty cool. lol

 

Can't agree more. They do nothing for me either.

 

I signed in just so I could hit the like button on this one! A classic! Lol

 

What about mine? "Women are not bad,they're just women..."

 

in retrospect the rant part was a slight over-reaction. basically one power tube had an intermittent open circuit after 2-1/2 years of use and i discovered one small signal tube to be microphonic, which i never checked for originally.
even though i love the tung sol KT120 tubes, a full complement of current production small signal tung sols did not yield a sound i could live with- very detailed but thin and not very dimensional.
i plugged in the RCA 5963s and 50's Amperex 12AX7s and left the Tung Sol in the 12Au7 preamp spot.
Sounds quite amazing this way although I will order the NOS tubes as mentioned earlier.
In terms of sound quality the NOS small signal tubes sound so much better it really is an eye- re-opener.

 

I thought the same until last week when I received a pair of TJ Full Music 12AX7 for my Phono preamp, an EAR 834 "clone". All I can say is that despite having something like 35/40 NOS (some new in original boxes) 12AX7, the TJ Full Music are the best of the best I've had/have, and I have used NOS RCA 12AX7 with black plates from the late 1950's, NOS RCA 5751 with black plates, NOS General Electric 12AX7 and of course my arsenal of Japanese 12AX7/12AU7 NOS some NIB from brands like Hitachi and Hit Ray (a joint venture between Hitachi and Raytheon in Japan in the 60's, tubes bear the Hitachi logo) which are my favourites, Matsushita and Toshiba. None of them can compare to the sound of the TJ Full Music 12AX7,even the RCA with black plates from the 1950's. Some say the look and sound much like old Telefunken.

 

I think you went through a worthwhile exercise. I'm pretty sold on the superiority of NOS tubes but from time to time you find some new production tubes that work well in certain applications (or just work well in general). Power tubes in particular I've had some good experiences with new tubes and I'm curious to try more.

 

I'm not sure what exactly you chose to use as your current production input tubes. But if you chose 100% Tungsols from end to end, then I'm not at all surprised by your results. Most of the Tunsols I have tried lean towards bright and slightly thin-sounding side. You need something darker, and fleshier in the midrange, tubes to offset this coloration in my experience. New production Gold Lion input tubes can often complement the Tungsols very well.

 

Could you pare that down a bit?

 

Meaning? I'm sorry I'm a native Spanish (from Spain,Europe).

 

Don't worry about it, I thought your post (and your English) was fine. I think he meant that it kind of read like one long sentence with a bunch of names and numbers, but I've been following your recent tube adventures and it seemed clear to me