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Best Tubes on Market today?

I'd like to upgrade tubes on my Mastersound Compact 845 SET.
I'm getting a loud buzzing noise from both channels at  listening position which I find extremely annoying.
 My current tubes are Shuguang 845C (cheap Chinese electron). Pre amp tubes are Tungsram ECC82 and driver tubes 6SN7 EH. Probably all cheap stock tubes. I Love the the sweet sound but noise level is unacceptable.  Also very audible transformer noise, but I doubt there is a fix for that. Are there other ways to minimize tube/transformer noise?

What are the most reliable aforementioned tubes out there and what is the best place to get them?
Upscale audio seems to have quite a selection. PSVANE was also recommended by some. 
 I would prefer not to spend more than $600 on 845 tubes and hoping for reliable clean sounding tubes all around.    
I also have C2600 preamp with stock tubes. Any advice on those? 
ei001h
robert53
444 posts
 
Andy's Vintage Tubes is very good. I also had a good experience with Vacuum Tubes Inc.. After purchasing NOS tubes from a few places and some of the tubes went bad quickly, I bought a set of RCA12au7 Clear Top from Vacuum Tubes Inc.. They were cheaper than anywhere else, and are still working perfectly after a few months.
bigkidz
3,370 posts
 

Tube recommendations are subjective.  For example I build a DHT DAC.  We used NOS tubes which are getting hard to find these days.  But no being new tubes, I could not sell the product retail.  We tried Chinese DHT tubes which in the beginning were just OK.  Then we measured the specs and adjusted the voltage and then everything snapped into place.  For the noise, as suggested above, try to isolate to see what the cause is from.  Basic transformer noise try to cover the transformer or shield the AC cables.


Happy Listening

paul77e's avatar
paul77e
32 posts
 
https://sophiaelectric.com
arrowheadrss
30 posts
 
My suggestion to you is DO NOT buy any new tubes till you get the buzzing issue resolved. If you cannot get the buzzing issue resolved, as previously suggested, purchase a new amp.( life is to short to listen to a buzzing system) When you get to the point that you are ready to purchase new tubes DO NOT buy them from outlets like ebay or amazon, those sellers are far from professional tube dealers. A professional tube dealer will perform several different tests and use different pieces of test equipment for those tests before their tubes are determined to be good enough for sale. There is a lot of dishonesty in the tube business, many of our customers paid high prices for what were supposed to be NOS (NEW old stock) tubes but after the tubes were tested by a professional the tubes were determined to be USO (USED old stock) or even worse JOS (JUNK old stock) Most non professionals only run one test on there tube tester and that only determiners whether the tube is good or bad and what percentage of life is left in the tube. All NOS tubes should test at 100% and nothing else or it is used. If you are a critical listener and have a very reveling system, even with tubes that test 100%, only a certain percentage of those tubes test good enough for preamps and even a smaller percentage for phono preamps. Another trick we have seen, that tube buyers must be aware of is this, sellers are buying cheap tubes and using steel wool to remove the name off of the tube and then painting a different name (one that is much more expensive) on the tube and of course that tube tests out at 100% so it is sold as NOS. Most of the time if you put these tubes in the freezer over night you will be able to see parts of the printing that was removed. Buy from a reputable tube dealer and avoid all these problems and more.
gsmith5
37 posts
 
Best 845 tube I have tried is made by Elrog (German). I use them as power tubes in my Cayin CS-845A integrated amp. The 845 tube was designed by RCA (1939)
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