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Newbie question. Which brand of tubes should I buy?


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I'm going to experiment with replacing the 12ax7 in my Valve Jr head with a 12au7 and/or a 5751. Tubes are cheap enough that I don't mind paying for a brand new one, but I'm also a bargain hunter and I see a lot on Ebay.

 

Are there any brands to stay away from? I see that Mullard's are very expensive. Is there that much of a difference? I see a lot of RCA's, GE's, Telefunken, Electro Harmonix, etc. Any suggestions?

 

Is it worth experimenting or should I just go buy some new JJ's?

 

Any advice/wisdom would be appreciated.

TC

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Vintage tubes on Ebay can be a real crapshoot....at least if you buy new JJ's you know what your getting and a reputable dealer will stand behind them should you get a bad one. That being said I got lucky on some vintage GE 5751's on ebay but they are out there if you don't mind a little risk. On the 5751 topic the Jan's have a good reputation too. Good luck and have some fun rollin glass!

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I bought a pair of GE 5751's on ebay from the same vendor. One lasted only a couple of months before it became microphonic...the other is doing great and resides in my VJ right now. Great tube....less gain than the AX7 but much "warmer". I can still get some great crunch out of this tube, and when a tubescreamer is pushing it hard it sounds incredible. Cant remember how much I paid, but it wasn't a whole lot more than buying 12AX7 tubes.

 

On the sewatt site (which is still down), I posted some JJ 12AX7 (ECC83S) / GE5751 comparison clips. Not the greatest playing, but gives a good idea of how they sound.

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