A pair of "warm sounding"6922 tub


Hi:Can you guys recommand a pair of "warm sounding(maybe the warmest)"6922 for Audible Illusions Modulus 3A.I am currently using SIEMENS CCa;happy with everything,but warmth.THANK YOU!!!!!!!!!
jitmingl

Showing 2 responses by jax2

I recently did some rolling with an Audiophile buddy with 6922's in our ARC-LS2B's. These amps are hybrid designs and use only a single 6922 tube so YMMV. In fact I believe observations regarding specific tube types would vary widely depending on what hardware you are putting the tubes in, so take all advice with a bag of salt. The LS2B's are definitely sensitive to tube choice. We rolled Tele CCa, Siemens CCa (Rohre) and Mullard E88CC's. Both of us liked the Siemens the best for the detail and focus it seemed to bring mostly in the mids and upper register. Of the three the Mullard was the warmest sounding, but at the expense of focus, and didn't seem to have as much dynamics in the mids and upper ranges. Since then my friend has been using a recommendation of Kevin Deal: the Rocket 6H30 and seems to like it VERY much. I understand it is not compatible with all hardware that uses a 6922, but cannot expand on that as I don't know the specifics. You may want to check those out too as they'd save you some $ at around $25-30 each. I have not heard it myself, but do respect my friends opinion.

Mdomnick and Dudeaudio: I need an education here regarding Amperex (you both mention using their tubes). I was under the impression that Amperex as a company did not actually manufacture tubes, but instead sourced them from various manufactures. Of course other companies do this as well but I was under the impression that Amperex exclusively sourced it's tubes and actually never owned or managed manufacturing facilities of their own. Is this true, or have I been mislead in this information? I have some wonderful Amperex 12ax7's that were actually manufactured by Tungsram in Hungary....just wonderful tubes for my application.

Good luck with your quest Jitmingl!
Mdomnick - The Rocket 6H30 tubes I mentioned are Russian tubes and are supposed to be very good. However I have tried the Sovtek version of the 6922 tubes and they were horrible in comparison to the other tubes I mentioned in my earlier post. I don't think you can broadly generalize that all Russian tubes are bad/good...it would depend entirely on the specific tubes. For intstance in the realms of EL34's JJ Tesla, and Electro Harmonix (a 'refined' version that Sovtek actually manufactures) are two of my favorite current production tubes, while others like Svetlana's. One thing I have found with the Russian tubes I have used is that they are not the most reliable tubes. I've had two arc on me straight out of the box on two different occasions (two different manufacturers, and two different components too). They were replaced immediately by the (reputable) dealer no questions asked and no further incidents took place beyond the individual failures. John at The Tube Store, has told me that his experience has been that, yes, this is indeed the case with Russian current production tubes. Russia does manufacture quite a large quantity of the currently made tubes and are one of only a few countries still doing so.

Sorry, don't know anything about Teslovak. It looks like they source some of their tubes from China (Shuguang) too.