SVT pre-amp question

DeanofRock · Newbie Alert Joined: 22 Jun 2006 Posts: 2

Hey all. I'm new here, and I was wondering if any of you could shed some light on the topic of pre-amp tubes in SVTs.
I'm fairly certain my SVT-AV still has the original 12AX7s. Some guy on CraigsList has a pair of 12AX7R2s on sale for cheap, but I can't seem to find any thorough review of these tubes.
Has anyone had any experience with these tubes? Or for that matter, have any of you experimented with how other pre tubes affect your sound?

Thanks!

-Dean

emoblues · Posted: Sat Aug 05, 2006 9:30 am Post subject: preamp tubes

The only brand of preamp tubes I use is JJ (tesla). Keep in mind, there are only 3 tube factories left in the world- two in Russia and the other in China, and they make all the tubes that are available today. I believe that the russian factories produce far better tubes than the chinese made ones. There are certain companies, JJ Tesla for one that have tubes made to THEIR specs and cannot be used with any other brand on them. Companies like Groove Tubes and Ruby Tubes do not practice this and basically have their name put on whatever is produced from general stock from any of the manufacturers. The russian factories are Sovtek and Svetlana and the Sovtek factory is the one, I believe, that produces the JJ tubes. You will hear the difference in output volume and overall warmth- trust me. I think the 12ax7's/ECC83's go for about $10. Far better than the $15-$20 that GT wants for some of their "special" tube models. These are so good that they take approx. 20 hours of use to actually break in. Hope this helps. ....Mike