Electro Harmonix Tubes (12AX7s in this case)

[petemoore]

  EH's are great tubes for the price.
  High Gain...all the new ones are consistantly higher gain IIReadC.
  And this seems to be true.
  Got a batch of EH here, work fine, make Valve Jr. sound harder edged...which is cool...
  But as soon as I see 12a_7 I'm inclined to think the 'u', 't', or 'w' would sound improve compared to the 'x' 7, especially in V1 of a preamp. None of my 12ax7 preamp V1 posistions actually have 12ax7's in them unless I'm looking for high gain and high gain, they can sound brittle and hard when I'm looking for lower gain sound.
  Any old anything that fits the bill seems to work well, ultrasonics / sylvanias...
  Some of the new stocks from JJ and Tung Sol have fared well in comparison tests, I would buy them again.

[mac]

Cool tips, considering that tubes are about us$15 in my country. Sometimes it is cheaper for me to place an order abroad and pay freight and 50% import tax.

The older (10 to 20 years ago) Sovtek-labelled ones seemed a lot better.

I have the original Sovtek in my class A LC30, still sound ok, ¿4-5 years?, 1-2 hs on every day.

mac

[drewl]

It really is hit or miss unfortunately.
I'm going through a bunch of EH's and JJ's trying to get the quietest combination for a Randall amp I'm fixing.
Pull just about any 30 or 40 yr old GE out of an old Fender amp amp it'll kill any new tube.....at least Sovtek/EH is trying to come up with new designs.