I need a lower gain 12au7 for Mastersound

A friend lent me a 300 BPSE I think it was (24 watt 300b) and it was such a beautiful amplifier. I don't remember anything but a black quiet noise floor and beautiful blooming music with that amp.

Is it something you notice during playback or is it something that bothers you in some other way? I second the Andy rec but just take your time waiting as order to ship time is s l o w.

On another note I've heard the Trienta with all Valhalla and a Thor conditioner and it was extremely clean and clear with stock tubes. In other words maybe look at something other than tubes??? Cell phone near by, modem, lighting, computer plugged into same breaker, etc..??

Enjoy!

Ddderek,

I've found el34's- the Winged C, actually, to be "noisy", with a hiss at idle even with the volume turned all the way down. That, however, was on a Golden Tube Audio amp, which don't have the best build quality. MastersounD is in a different league.

I don't know if it's your drivers or the power tubes. What I do know is that MastersounD amps don't usually do this sort of thing- they are of high quality. My Compact 845 is dead quiet with 97 db/w/m speakers.

What I can do to help rectify the issue is this- I don't use the preamp section on my Compact 845. I use it as a straight power amp. Hence, I took the preamp tubes I bought for it- Telefunken smooth plates- out and tossed the Electro Harmonix back in the amp. No sense running the Telefunkens if they're out of the circuit.

So....if you want to try out a Telefunken 12au7 and see if the hiss goes away, let me know. Fire me an e-mail through Audiogon. You can try mine. If they work, great, you can then get a pair yourself and send mine back. If they don't eliminate the hiss, send them back to me, knowing they're not the issue. When I did use the Compact 845 as an integrated with the Telefunken tubes, it was dead quiet. No hiss. So, I know these NOS tubes are not defective. Let me know.

Found an old Westinghouse 12au7 kicking around in one of my boxes, put it in..... right channel has almost no hiss at all.

I have some pairs of Telefunken smooth and ladder plates which have lots of detail but quiet.

Glad to hear it was an easy solution!!! Thanks for the follow up!!!