Why are people paying these stupid tube prices?

That's right. ....they don't make em anymore.    I have purchased from this seller before and tubes were time capsule condition

@oddiofyl : back in 2016 I bought four RCA 6L6GC black plate tubes taken from my friend's Fender amp. $300 - and worth it!

I can't believe it, but I just paid $300 for a pair of 1950's NOS RCA Black  plate 12AX7 and $150 for 1950's 12AU7 ......    Unobtanium and worth it.   

We should have some empathy for poor musicians. They have their Marshall stacks getting bounced around in a van every night.

I ran Jadus tube gear for years,in the 90s it cost more than a grand to retube a defy7....solid state has come so far in the past decade ie..Boulder,Constellation, Dartzel, Pass labs etc there is no reason to mess with tube amps anymore imo

I guess nobody else has noticed the tube MANUFACTURER, New Sensor / EH, is setting even higher prices than Viva tubes on their own web store. But I guess it’s just fun to bash Viva tubes for some reason? They’re doing you a favor, if you really need (not for spares or OCD) a power tube that’s out of stock elsewhere. They had to price high enough to discourage hoarders and scalpers.

The big power tubes is where the crunch is, because there’s no vintage alternatives to fill the void. The vintage small tubes should still last for many years. It’s bad to need KT120 or KT150 right now, with Gold Lion KT88 close behind. KT170 is also bad to need, but at least there aren't a lot of amps out there that use it.

I have been using Viva tubes for the last three years, purchased about 20 small tubes from them in that time, all were priced well with good long term reliability in the pieces of gear they were purchased for, haven't looked but have all their prices skyrocketed like the KT150s?

I’ll never buy from Viva….not that they even care 

Viva tubes are the only ones that I see who are out of line and I would bet they aren't selling any.  Surely no one has lost their mind and are paying $350 for a KT 150.  

I have purchased from Viva in the past but will not forget their strategy here and will never shop there again.

There is a Darkstar amp for sale local to me….  Comes with hundreds of dollars worth of “NOS” tubes …. $350

Makes no sense to use unobtainium holy grail tubes in stuff like like that ….not being snobby, just practical.   

Once a week I get the Audiowaygone update. Today this caught my eye and caused quite a bit of amusement. So people who are accustomed to bragging rights prices and 60k audio cables are now complaining about high prices. IF you idiots had not paid these prices to begin with and act like money is no problem you would have found the scalpers would not have shown up to begin with. Stick your hand out flat on the table, hit it with the hammer again and tell me it still hurts when you do so.  You can't teach the unteachable.

Wow, I own a DS2 preamp, a Levinson 27.5 amp, and I own Schiit headphone amps, one has Siemens tubes, the other a E-6SN7, with good Focal headphones these cheap Schiit amps are pretty formidable in sound quality. The E-6SN7 tubed amp is the best, but these are not NOS. The Siemens amp is collecting dust, and the tube was before I bought the amp. I have a lot of old tubes, 12A?7s, 6DJ8s, 6SN7s, and more collecting dust. I have probably listened to all of them for at least a short time, so I can't sell them as NOS, other than a few Chinese 6SN7 and Russian KT88, and various 300Bs, so I must be the worst of the worst, listening to alleged NOS tubes, and making them slightly used just to determine how they sound, and them sitting on them. I also have a home made KT88 amp I haven't even plugged in...

Starting to feel like there’s a "go green" agenda or something! 😉  Politician: "Just go out and buy a digital/solid state amp."

@mulveling  it is a prevalent pattern to see folks rolling rare vintage tubes into cheap chi-fi or even cheap Schiit amps, especially headphone gear. Especially 6SN7 and 6922. It always rubbed me the wrong way too. What a waste.

Quite so. In economics an analogy has long been called "tragedy of the commons".  A slightly edited quote from Wiki -

a situation in which individual users, who have open access to a resource unhampered by shared social structures or formal rules that govern access and use,^[act independently according to their own self interest and, contrary to the common good of all users, cause depletion of the resource through their uncoordinated action.

The value of the tubes to the community is much higher than the prices they are being traded at privately.

My Schiit Saga with the 6SN7 tube buffer will embarrass a lot of high price preamps. Yes. Bettered my ARC SP6B, no slouch. This stuff is really good. No waste of tubes.

Perhaps it would be best if we just prevented anyone that wasn’t part of your elite group from purchasing any tubes at all. That way, the people that deserve all the best in life, like YOU, will keep the best things in life for yourselves.

I knew this would rattle the sensitive ones looking for a fight and hyperbolic analogies to Marie Antionette (rolls eyes). I could equally state that guys like you who habitually drag these conversations to the mat are what gives the audiophile community a bad rap. Nowhere did I say it wasn’t anyone’s right to stick round plate 6SN7 or pinched waist 6922 into a Chi-fi amp. They’re not excommunicated from audiophile-dom if they do this. Just stated my opinion (backing the other guy who said it first) that there are better uses for these dwindling resources.

  Prices are crazy on everything. Diesel $6.40 gal, 5.56 ammo $500 per thousand. You guys outta try feeding class III guns 😆. Maybe I should bitch about all the wanna be’s that have those cheap AR clones. The butt hurt factor is alive and well on AGON. Oh yeah I’m blue collar too. Just spent last weekend watching drag races in an ag field in central Ca. My problem is I dabble in too many things with too little money. So I guess we all suffer First World problems. I have to remember Rule 62 “ Don’t take yourself so damn seriously “. Regards, Mike B. 

oddiofyl 

"Maybe if people didn’t buy $200 headphone amps and burn up rare tubes for mediocre sound we wouldn’t have this problem"

I believe Marie Antoinette was of the same opinion when she said...... 

"Let them eat cake."

This sort of arrogant elitism is why many people are disgusted by

audiophiles.

Time for a reality check, buddy. The rest of the world isn't here to serve you.

I am 100 % a Blue Collar guy.    You don’t know me at all,  I am 100% correct in what I say about the absolute waste of rare NOS tubes in complete junk.  You are the same douche that buys that piece of crap and whines about how it sounds like crap with NOS this or that.  Give me a break 

@mulveling 

"Yes, it is a prevalent pattern to get to see folks rolling rare vintage tubes into cheap chi-fi or even cheap Schiit amps, especially headphone gear. ....... On the upside you can buy their tubes after they move onto the next flavor of them month."

Perhaps it would be best if we just prevented anyone that wasn't part of your elite group from purchasing any tubes at all. That way, the people that deserve all the best in life, like YOU, will keep the best things in life for yourselves.

@oddiofyl 

"Maybe if people didn’t buy $200 headphone amps and burn up rare tubes for mediocre sound we wouldn’t have this problem"

I believe Marie Antoinette was of the same opinion when she said...... 

"Let them eat cake."

This sort of arrogant elitism is why many people are disgusted by

audiophiles.

Time for a reality check, buddy. The rest of the world isn't here to serve you.

facten

2,141 posts

05-25-2022 at 08:45am

TubeDepot isn’t presently selling the TS KT150 - look at the specific page

 

I may be wrong but I don’t think Psvane or Linlai make KT150s

The New Sensor factory owned by fuzz-pedal inventor and marketer extraordinaire Mike Matthews is the only manufacturer, under the Tung Sol label, of KT 150’s. So no, you are not wrong. 

Same thing happened to whale oil when it got scarce:

Over a span of 35 years which embraced the Civil War, whale oil ranged from 30 1/2¢ per gallon to $1.92 according to the following prices which are taken from Eaton's book, "Petroleum", 1866:

Another source mentions that the average price from 1845 to 1855 was $1.77 per gallon (Stotz, 1938).

In the war year 1864, the price per 35 gallon barrel was $67.20.  It is not known if this is sperm whale oil or oil from any species.

Sperm whale oil commanded a higher price just like better tubes.
If it's not one thing, it's another.

All the best,
Nonoise
 

Yes, it is a prevalent pattern to see folks rolling rare vintage tubes into cheap chi-fi or even cheap Schiit amps, especially headphone gear. Especially 6SN7 and 6922. It always rubbed me the wrong way too. What a waste. On the upside you can buy their tubes after they move onto the next flavor of them month, but a lot of times it will only be a single.

Anyways, the current tube shortage / price crisis really mainly affects power tubes, which don’t have vintage alternatives available in quantity.

It was sarcasm,  but if you visit any headphone site you will see people rolling precious nos into chi fi amps.....

You "just ordered a set of 4 KT150 power tubes for $139.00 each..."  !!!!

I think you can answer your question very well yourself.

I asked myself the same question 20+ years ago.  My answer, "you're out of your mind.  It's not going to get better.".  Today I have solid state.  I have been fighting off the urge to go "Tube" again.   Thank you for bringing me back to my senses.

@oddiofyl I highly doubt these $200.00 headphone amps have a quality tube in them. Bet the tube they supply is the cheapest part. 

I know it was sarcasm. 

Maybe if people didn’t buy $200 headphone amps and burn up rare tubes for mediocre sound we wouldn’t have this problem

@tony1954 okay got it. 

Maybe if people didn’t buy $200 headphone amps and burn up rare tubes for mediocre sound we wouldn’t have this problem

LOL. They'd be much better of with a $3000 power cord.

I'm not expecting WE tubes to be inexpensive,  I  just bought two pair of 300b.  What I do expect is for them to be of high quality.   

You have a better chance of finding a dispensary sale. Well, maybe not you mountain and west coast kids.

@music_is_life 

I must agree with @ketchup . I had no idea what your original post meant until there were subsequent posts to help decipher it.

I was told  by a reputable source that WE will be producing small signal tubes and power tubes .....not might, will be

I would not expect them to be inexpensive.

Maybe if people didn’t buy $200 headphone amps and burn up rare tubes for mediocre sound we wouldn’t have this problem

@lowrider57

And with New Sensor, the Russian government stopped tubes from being exported, causing a supply chain interruption.

I believe this is mutual with the US banning imports from Russia

The executive action bans imports from key sectors of Russia’s economy, such as seafood, alcohol and nonindustrial diamonds, according to the text of the order.

That action will block more than $1 billion in Russian revenues and help ensure American citizens are not “underwriting” President Vladimir Putin’s war in Ukraine, the White House said in a fact sheet.

Banned imports

The only place Iam willing to pay is Grant Fidelity, some tube dealers they just recycled.Be careful, and don’t panic.

The manufacturer New Sensor / Electro Harmonix sells the tubes on their own online store. Their prices have increased drastically in the past month or 2. Take a gander - KT120 for $150 each. Gold Lion KT88 $170 each. You can imagine the KT150 and 170 prices. Between double and triple the previous "usual" prices, across the board. That may or may not be indicative of prices going forward. But in a worst case scenario, those are the "new" tube prices, and any onshore vendors selling for anything less than that are simply burning through existing stock on hand.

In a better case scenario, these are just temporary price spikes intended to keep hoarders from wiping out existing stocks before we get a better picture for the long-term prospects of Russian manufacturing.

Been loving SS since 1965! I’m still enamored by those SS devices. Tube heads are boobheads. 
 

Tubes: A fool’s errand!

TubeDepot isn’t presently selling the TS KT150 - look at the specific page

I may be wrong but I don't think Psvane or Linlai make KT150s

Tube Depot has KT150's for 144.95.  They are Tung Sol, so not sure if they are good enough for your amp.

Back in the day, we used 6550's, which were pretty good tubes, and KT88's as well.  Tube Depot as those as well.

Cheers!

The Shunguang plant in China is not up and running yet. As a state-owned enterprise the government seized the property after a fire at the facility. I don't know at what stage the new factory is in, but we won't see their tubes soon.

And with New Sensor, the Russian government stopped tubes from being exported, causing a supply chain interruption. Now that the factory is running at full capacity, their brands are available again. But the scuttlebutt is the US and Canada have added a 35% tariff to Russian imports.

In the US, WE has produced some tubes other than 300b's and are beta-testing them in a select group of audiophile's systems. There are very good reviews of their 6SN7. 

1. Tubes burning out

2. Covid 

3. Russia

4.  Audiophiles burning money 

5. The laws of supply and demand

Only common,  and desirable tubes are being gouged..   My forthcoming amp uses e180f for the driver / input position,  I just picked up a pair of NOS Telefunken for $150.   A lot , sure , but imagine if they were CCA or 12ax7?    I bought Mullard and Amperex e180f and they were between $6 and $20 each for true nos.   First time in 20 years getting a break on the price of tubes.

I was told  by a reputable source that WE will be producing small signal tubes and power tubes .....not might, will be

'Why are people paying these stupid tube prices?'

1.   Panic buying.

2.   Speculation.

3.   Certainly a big part of the increase is caused by 1. and 2.

4.   Therefore greed.

5.   And selfishness.

Aren't we a horrible lot!

It could be worse if you had a Jadis JA200MKII.

Most of  China is shut down again due to the COVID 19. Another spike in the bug over there.

Maybe Shuguang in China can increase production? 

Um, perhaps you should have mentioned Viva Tubes pricing in your o.p.? I’m with the others… it read poorly. Sorry. Regarding tube prices in general, inflation sucks. Everything is more expensive. But tubes don’t seem too bad overall. Good ones have always been a bit pricy.

Free market capitalism without government price regulation and the individual freedom to purchase, not purchase or find an alternative. Its all good man (Better Call Saul).

Vendors should price at what market will allow (that is real price).  Apologies if this all sounds insensitive, markets are adjusting and will find their equilibrium based on purchase decisions. But, I totally get the initial shock.

Another movie reference; "sell me this pen."