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Rolled some 12ax7's recently...

Hi All,
I went through my supply of 12ax7's recently and found some goodies.
I recently compared Bugle Boys to Telefunkens in the phono stage of my pre-amp. Interesting (to me, at least). I found the Telefunkens to be nice sounding; very clean and clear, very nice detail, over all a very nice sounding tube. The Bugle Boys, however, were magical! WOW! Timbre was so much more apparent. The soundstage depth and width increased; especially the depth. The music seemed to come alive and glow. It was much more captivating.
I found such a dramatic difference between two high quality tubes very interesting.
I have yet to try 10m's, and 70's Mullards that I found. I will report when I do...
By the way, NOS Sylvania's sound nice in the line-level stage. All tubes reported are vintage NOS. I match them with my tube tester. And, I do not change the volume setting between tube brands tested.
Any comments are more than welcomed! I appreciate any information on your experiences with 12ax7's. The price of some of these NOS is incredible; I am glad to have these nice examples in my collection!
Cheers.
bicycle_man
fbi
92 posts
 
~~~~Tried various 12ax7, 5751, 5751wa in my modded jolida jd100 cdp. GE 5751WA (1958) gives the best overall sound performance. YMMV

Just The Facts
By
nsgarch's avatar
nsgarch
2,524 posts
 
FBI: A lot of folks really like the GE 3-mica blackplates. Is that what you have in your Jolida?

Phil and Bicycle:
The TFK 12AX7's were the first tubes I replaced in my new McIntosh MC275 -- and boy! did they make a night and day difference. (McIntosh used to use TFK's as OEM tubes back in the day ;-(( They are good tubes, but waaay overpriced these days IMO. I guess my favorite AX7 was the RCA 17mm long blackplate.
fbi
92 posts
 
~~~~Nsgarch, You are correct. They have deeeep natural bass, wonderful presence, and extended highs. Now if I could get them to wash the car, walk the dog, and cut the grass...Now were talkin!

Just The Facts
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abucktwoeighty's avatar
abucktwoeighty
1,079 posts
 
Fbi, Nsgarch, I have Svetlana 12AX7's in my modded Jolida JD100 CDP, and am now thinking of trying the 5751's. Nsgarch, you mentioned the 5751'a are spec'd at 70%-80% the gain of the 12AX7's. I'm presently using a set of Rothwell 10db attenuators with the Jolida to help with the gain. Sounds like the 5751's will help a little more in that respect.
rlawry
477 posts
 
Best 12AX7 I have tried is the very rare and expensive CBS/Raytheon D-getter 7729. I also have a pair of O-getters that are close, but avoid the later CBS/Raytheon with the O-getter and 7729 etched in the glass. These last ones were actually made by GE and sound rather ordinary. Once I heard these I sold my Telefunken ECC803S, a nice tube but thin and lean tonally in comparison.
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