Tube rolling Question

Hi geofkait, most probably and ideally they should sound better but if synergy comes to the mix they will probably don't. As for golden ear status please be open minded and open eared, no biases in audio, try, try, try and try. The best example is in the E88CC family where the finest sounding ones (and a lot cheaper) are 6N23P from the 70's by far. This is my experience after trying every possible NOS (still having more than 300). Most NOS are a waste of time (educated though), money should be spent on LP's.

geoffkait:

Your star has descended behind the bog.

Synergy? Give me a break! The Ruskies won’t take umbrage at what I’m about to say because they don’t know what umbrage means. But the Ruskies don’t experiment with various brands of tubes. They just use whatever tubes are left over from the last MiG-25, The Ruskies are known for using the cheapest parts they can get and still get the thing to work. I was in the pink building with no windows. They weren’t making doughnuts 🍩  in there.

@petg60- In over 40 years of paying close attention/listening to tubes, and the opinions of those intimately involved; the ONLY small signal, Russian-made tube, I’ve ever seen mentioned(either octal or nine-pin/any family) in any comprehensive comparison, is the 6N23P. THEN, ONLY Reflektor’s SWGP, silver shield,1974-75 iterations, hit the top ranks. Those of other makers(ie: Voskhod), years and construction methods, varied greatly. Production of the really good sounding ones, was limited to an extremely narrow time frame. Once the sound was discovered, most NOS examples, of Reflektor’s star iterations disappeared, quickly. Of course; you brought up the 6DJ8/E88CC family of tubes, in which there have been a plethora of excellent tubes, manufactured over a couple decades(50’s and 60’s/Siemens, Telefunken/Amperex, etc), and still obtainable(though expensive). Try finding any of the good sounding 6N23P’s now, at bargain prices. I tried to find some, for my CDP, to try against it’s six Siemens(early Sixties/grey shield) CCa’s. No luck/unobtainium(at anything resembling a reasonable price)! The really good/very rare Russian versions, were a flash in the pan. Back to the 6SN7 topic: let’s hear about ANY Russian version, that’s ever been favorably compared, in a NOS shootout. Of course; as subjective as listening tastes are, as varied our systems, rooms and aural acuity- no one can EVER say, what’s right/best for anyone else. One can only listen/experiment, for themselves, limited by what they’re willing to spend, in time/funds and/or, how badly they desire excellence(whatever their perception), in presentation.