Go to www.audioasylum.com and look in the tube asylum. Do a search for EL34 and you will find much more information that you want. This has really been discussed to death. For current production tubes the favorites seem to be JJ and Svetlana. Like you, I can't afford NOS Mullards. I am using JJ E34L and am quite happy with them. A good source for the JJ E34L is Bob at Eurotubes.com.
