Audio Research VT100 tube replacement


Hi everyone, I am new to tube amps and I need to re-tube this amp. I have discovered that some music lovers prefer the sound of NOS tubes over the ones Audio Research sells. I will have my Audio Research dealer bias the amp when I purchase the new tubes. My question is what tubes would some of you with more experience suggest. My musical tastes include pop, rock, dance and some classical. I do enjoy listening at moderate to higher volumes most of the time (don't know if that helps in choosing tubes). My preference would be for smooth sounding highs and mids with punchy bass, my ears are sensitive to higher frequencies and I find that I get listener fatigue very easily from a lot of different solid state and certain metal dome tweeters. Any suggestions would be much appreciated, also any tube retailers that you have had good experience with would be great. Thanks to all and happy holidays
siffled
Thanks to all of you for your advice, and happy holidays to all of you. As for my amp it is a mk 2 and is not under warranty. Based on all the responses I will have ARC replace the tubes. I also found out from my ARC dealer that they warranty their tubes for 90 days and it is not uncommon for them to cover their tubes for longer. Also should a tube installed by ARC damage anything else in the amp, then ARC covers it if the cause was from the tubes. So for piece of mind as stated above I am going to go with ARC. Again thanks to all for your advice and happy holidays to all.
Siffled, isn't there an ARC warranty repair place in your city? Or are you in MN?
"Winged Cs not available anymore?
Right here: http://www.upscaleaudio.com/products/SED-%22Winged-C%22-6550C.html

And many other Tube retailers. ARC is currently putting these in there AMPs. Btw..its $1K for a full set of output/input tubes from ARC. About $600 if you buy elsewhere. I'm currently looking to re tube my VT100 MKI as well. Not sure what I'm going to do.....The Electro Harmonix looks interested a almost 1/2 the price of the winged C...
Geek,
thanks. It appears upscale has run into problems supplying 6550s for VT100s since they won't (knowingly) sell you the tubes. They must have had customers install the tubes and bad things happened.

I guess I'll just buy from ARC and an additional $400 bucks.
ss