best tubes for Aesthetix Calypso

I tried mullard and telefunken 12AX7's and settled on RCA 5751 all nos tubes. I also tied the nos sylvania 5751's they were a little noisey, ended up using them in my Rogue M-180 amps in place of their 12ax7 input tubes. Joe's tube lore on audioaslyum is very helpful except unfortunatly the prices are out of date. The good news with the Calypso is there are only 4 tube.

I needed 6dj8 or equivalent for my phono stage (TTVJ). I bought Matsushita and Philips 7dj8 from Kevin @ Upscale. I never got the chance to even try the Phillips because the Matsushita sound incredible. I was using Amperex before and I'll never go back.

Don't buy NOS tubes there are a million reasons not , but the best is that it leaves more for me. I do in fact use NOS or old stock tubes but ir is very hard predicticting how they will sound in you system not to mention the less than great tubes circulating. Some high end tuybe suppliers may be able to help. I lmow at one point Andy's vintyage tube services retubed Aesthetix models. You may want to check with him. Some recent production tubes are really sounding quite good and are guarunteed, you may want to get a buch and see what appeals to yo you, ultimately it won't cost a lot more than really high quality NOS. But if you are bent on trying spome there there are more than a couple of decent Telefunken 12AX&s around and for 6922 the Amperex suggestion is a good one.

Mullard MCI-B67 ECC 83
Amperex 6922 NOS
If you can find them and want to pay the price :-)

I tried Telefunken smooth plates and 60's Mullards and like the stock Sovteks the most in the 12AX7 spot. I thought they were the clearest and cleanest without being analytical. The Mullards were too romantic without no bass and treble. The Telefunkens were just not clear enough.

Bob