Originally posted by Ken
What are the differences in tone you might hear between these two tubes in a amp's preamp section?
Thanks
Originally posted by hipfan
You might want to check Rivera's website too. They use the Sovtek "LP" tube (as opposed to the LPS) in some of their amps due to some kind of power supply design quirk. The LP is a slightly different tube than other 12ax7's, and it's explained somewhere on the Rivera website.
Originally posted by Ken
What are the differences in tone you might hear between these two tubes in a amp's preamp section?
Thanks
Originally posted by myles111
hipfan ...............
If you check with Paul Rivera, he may mention that he and I are sort of close. I am somewhat familar with his amps.
Originally posted by scottl
Ken, the WA's are the worst sounding 12ax7's I have heard.
My Fuchs sounded great with the JJ/TEsla 12ax7, the Ruby Chinese 9th Generation (most gain of all of them), the Electro Harmonix, and the EI Gold pin. All tubes were tested and guaranteed by Mike at KCA.
I can't comment on the LPS but why bother when the others sound good.....
Scott
Originally posted by hipfan
Hey, that's cool with me!
Thanks for the good info on the tubes.
Originally posted by myles111
Scott ....
The WA makes most amps sound as if a blanket was placed over the amp. The WA's are good current drivers, but like you, I do not like them in any tone generation or gain stages.
Sovtek is coming out with a new tooling WC. So far this tube in my first factory tests of these, they are pretty darn amazing. I do not know when they will be released to the public, but if the 100 samples I went though follow through to production, they will be a cool contender in the 12AX7 market, and probably at the same price as the WA or WB (that is now gone).
The test results on the new unrelased WC:
Originally posted by scottl
Myles, numbers look better for sure.... How does it sound though... Isn't there some intangible tone magic with tubes???
Also, many amp guys tell me unmatched inverters are ok. You say otherwise. They say that the design totally doesn't need matched triodes and that it means nothing. Have you heard this??? Fwiw, my Ruby 12ax7 was 100/100 on box so I used it in the driver slot.
Scott