Anyone Here Ever Purchased A Tube Tester?

I have a TV-7 and 3 other Hickoks.  The only drawback to any of these vs the Amplitrex, Etracer, and Maximatcher is the relatively low plate voltage applied to power tubes is insufficient for matching.  In a recent test of rare 8417 tubes, I used my 539B, which allows plate current monitoring.  After recording the data for each of 12 tubes, I took them to a friend's house who has a tester with up to 500 v on the plates, and meters on every element in the tube.  Over half of the theoretical matches my 539B predicted were wrong.  The TV-7 and similar Hickoks are fine for preamp tubes and detecting shorts in all tubes, but for matching, you need a higher plate voltage.  I'll probably get an Etracer kit at some point.    

viridian

KISS.

I purposely avoid knowing stuff, so I can make decisions that are 'good enough', like a simple tester.

If it sounds damn good, like my Sony xa5400cd player I got with help here, I don't want to know about anything else, unless it breaks. I probably would just buy another xa5400 without even looking at anything else.

I had a big Hickock, and the Jackson I mentioned, never went beyond shorts/strength/matched strength? Big, took more space, heavy, not easy to take to a friends house ...

After 'little accurate 157' simple short/strength answers were ALWAYS the same, I gave both the Hickock and Jackson away to friends.

I have a LOT of used tubes, hundreds, some of them actually new. I test them before giving to friends, or using myself, a few for the 2 Fisher 500C's I'm going to sell if I overcome my reluctance to ship.

I'm between NYC and Philadelphia, perhaps I will try pickup only. 

Another way, compared to buying an old tube tester, is buying a new one, tailormade for you. I did, some years ago - Beck RM-1 tube tester, made to order by Helmut Beck for the 8 main tube types in my system. A quality instrument with great support from Beck. Very easy and quick to use. But limited - it only measures emission, not the noise level of the tube. Yet I get some info on the tubes (more or less 'strong'), relevant for matching and evt replacing, and I avoid putting bad tubes into the system. Recommended.

I found a Healthkit TT-1A tester a few years ago that had been recently restored by a shop that understood this device. I don't use it often enough but it's great and (relatively) easy to use. It will test *almost* any tube made through 1978, including DHT and Nuvistors. It's a bit of a cumbersome beast. The paper rolls are in good shape but I find it easier to lead digital files on my laptop or access from a tablet.

Yesterday I tested all the 19 tubes in my preamp with the Beck RM1 tester. I found three 6922 tubes that measured very weak, and replaced them with spares that tested ok. I was rewarded with better sound. What is interesting is that I had not really noticed that the sound had become a poorer, more muffled, closed-in. Until I replaced the weak tubes. Then, the benefit was obvious. So I told myself - good idea to do this more often!

I know that the RM1 is limited, but in this case it worked well. The meter readings corresponded to the sound. So, I will have to buy three 6922s, not a full set of 18 6922s plus 1 12au7 (expensive for NOS). RM1 also catches bad tubes, including 6as7g, before I put them into my amplifier. I avoid tubes creating errors in the amp or preamp. RM1 doesn’t test transconductance or noise, but has actually saved me money over some years of use.

Whatever the tube tester, you may be able to develop your own system for testing the things it doesn’t test. Like the background tube noise level. I have a strict procedure, measuring the noise level of the tubes in my system with a db meter, compared to a standard reference (with volume loud, not playing music, with the tubes in my very noise-sensitive phono preamp). In case of dispute I can send the measures to the seller, to get my money back. A year ago I got a quad Telefunken that sounded good but had too much noise. I had to return them. I was sad and the seller was irritated ("but they test strong!").