Actually Mniquet I am changing tubes around as I write this. A little different scenario in that the amp is a REF5. I had a REF Anniversary for a year so I'm trying to narrow the gap. Tubes in it were Sovtek's dated 10-03, a batch known to have had issues. I'm playing with matched sets of 09-02's (better) 10-04, supposedly DR's, a pair of 85 DR's and a pair of 87 DR's. Just because there aren't enough variables I'm also playing with a 62 RCA 6550 coke bottle 6550 in the power supply. I find your comments about the characteristics of the modern vs the old DR's to be pretty spot on. Now, if I could control it from the remote.... The 10-03's were known to have a lot of problems both in outright failure and underperforming, sounding thin and bright. Seems to have been a production run issue. Anyway thanks for the confirmation.
