[jdandy]

Paul.......I have rolled many tubes through various preamplifiers and power amplifiers over the years. The experience has been entertaining and educational, but it ultimately comes down to your personal opinion how different tubes impact the sound of your system. I have had very few tubes that I would describe as sounding poor, both power tubes and preamp tubes. For the most part nearly everything I tried produced an enjoyable presentation, although certain tubes delivered additional sonic nuances that pleased me more than others. Again, this comes down to personal taste.

In power tube amplifiers I have used several different manufacturer's tubes, Electro Harmonix, Penta, and Gold Lion. To my ears the Gold Lion KT88's deliver the full audio spectrum in a manner that is musical, robust, and does not overemphasize any portion of the audio frequency range. I have been completely satisfied with Gold Lion KT88's power tubes for many years. Driver tubes in MC2301 power amplifiers have seen me use Siemens ECC801S, Telefunken ECC801S, and GEC A2900 (original Genalex 12AT7 made in Great Britain), as well as Gold Lion 12AT7 Gold Pin tubes. I settled on the Siemens ECC801S as delivering the best clarity and sonic integrity. The Siemens tubes have been in the MC2301 amps now for almost four years. Very pleased with their sound.

In my MC275 power amplifiers, as well as my C2200, C2300, and C1000C/T preamps, I used a number of 12AX7 tubes, Philips, Mullard, Telefunken, Tung-Sol, and Gold Lion. In the MC275 amplifiers the sound was not dramatically different with the exception of the NOS Mullard CV4004 (12AX7) tubes. In the power amps and the preamps the Mullards always displayed a tendency to be a bit bright for my ears. In the different preamplifiers the Tung-Sol 12AX7's and the Gold Lion ECC83 (12AX7) tubes sounded very close to one another. I kept the Tung-Sol's in the C1000C/T longer than the Gold Lions, although The Gold Lion tubes are what is in my C2300 now, that is except for the C2300 phono stage where I use Telefunken ECC83 (12AX7) tubes. They deliver excellent signal to noise ratio in the C2300 moving coil phono stage.

You can be conservative with tube rolling or go hog wild. There are plenty of tubes to try but the rabbit hole is deep if you jump in with both feet. Beware of purchasing NOS tubes from anyone other than totally reliable tube vendors. New old stock tubes are rare these days, and expensive if they are the real deal.