tube audio dealer in SF Bay area?

Here's two in the San Jose area that are really worth seeing.

Analog Room in San Jose has PremaLuma, Air Tight, BAT(?), Wavestream and four sound rooms with lots of analog gear. Oh, there's lots of records for sale. http://www.theanalogroom.com/

Nick Gowen of True Sound in Campbell carries Audiomat and Audio Note gear. He's also a hell of a tube service technician on most audio gear. http://www.tsound.com/

In SF and Berkeley there's Music Lover's Conrad Johnson and VTL.

If you go to Music Lovers in Berkeley be prepared to be insulted.

Me: Hi how's it going?
ML: Great, what speakers do you have?
Me: Thiel
ML: We don't like Thiel
Me: Well I do
ML: Well they don't sound good on classical music
Me: What speakers do you like?
ML: Wilson Audio
Me; How about Vandersteen?
ML: No don't care for them either

Lesson: I will not step foot in ML again.

As I said be prepared for the ultimate in nose-in-the-air- snobbery experience. PU.

Now that's bad showroom service and you don't have to reward them if you're treated that way.

Still if you're looking for specific tube amps brands they carry for a demo- they may have them. They also are generous on home demos.

My curiosity was peaked by this post and since i had some free time yesterday I dropped by to check out Music Lover's in Berkeley for the first time ever.

I was greeted by Will, the assistant manager, soon after I walked in and he asked if he could be of some help. I commented it was my first visit and just wanted to look around a bit. Fine with him.

Later I asked him some questions regarding cabling for a dedicated theater room I'm planning and he had what I thought were some good suggestions for my specific situation. He took the time to ask some general questions to get a better idea of my system. But he never got into asking specific brand names or anything unless I volunteered that information. He never put down any of my components either, but rather pointed out where improvements could be made in the future for better system synergy.

Then he noticed I had a few cd's I had brought with me and offered to set me up in a listening room. I spent the next hour and a half enjoying the new Luxman 550 class-A integrated on the new Paradigm floor standers without interruption.

He just left me alone and no sales pressure. He was very courteous and professional the whole time. I left with a good feeling. Even got to pet the resident cat.

John z,

I visited them a few months back after they moved into the new showroom. Same type of experience. So I am perplex as to what had happened to Stevecham. They provided some really good advice for my to-be-built listening room + HT system as well.

FrankC