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Sophia Electric EL34 or KT88 ??

Looking to upgrade my tubes on the Primaluna Dialogue HP Integrated amp. 
Curious what people’s preference would be between the two, and why. Aside from the SE rebranding, I’ve heard some pretty decent feedback about these tubes. 
They are expensive though, and frankly I’m
not sure why the different price classifications. 
Trying to sort out the sonic characteristics of each before dropping the dime on a matched set of 8 for the PL dialogue HP. 
Generally I like the factory EL34 musicality and tone. I love a holographic, real life feel and soundstage. I once tried a full battery of KT150 but sold them. Tried as I might to get acclimated to them, they didn’t have the Stock EL 34 magic. Seemed a little more dry. More powerful but also a tad more sterile. 

So would the SE KT88 be any different? 

Anyone with personal experience with these tubes?
128x128whacky
johnss
569 posts
 
yes, have experimented with these. Pretty good tubes. Sophia electric was the first of the high end custom materials Chinese tubes. The work from PSVANE and Shuguang now surpasses them.

If you want to try KT88s the ones to get are the WEKT88 red base. best KT88 out there right now. To really hear the difference on different output tubes though,  first you need to replace those factory coupling caps used by PL. Put some copper foils from Jupiter or Jensen in the amp before you try swapping tubes and you'll really hear what the difference in tubes can offer.

If you like the EL34 sound the other tube set to try is the PSVANE EL34-UK...really musical sounding tubes. but PSVANE makes several versions of EL34, so you will have to shop for the UK version.


tuberist
951 posts
 
Have you considered TungSol 7581A? I'm enjoying them in my PL Integrated and not crazy expensive.
decooney
1,967 posts
 
@whacky,
re: "I once tried a full battery of KT150 but sold them", "...not EL34 magic."

A few things to note fwiw. If the PL DP does not have the appropriate plate voltage or transformers to drive KT150s properly, it won’t sound right nor will it have the EL34 magic. Truly takes the right amp(s) and transformers to get the most out of KT150s, IME. Found this to be the case with multiple KT88 based amps.

In addition to PSVANE CV181-T, Shuguang or WEKT88, TS 7581As, and others mentioned, have you also looked into Genelex Gold Lyon KT77s? As I recall Jim McShane of McShane Design is a big fan of them too.

Noted a few others who prefer the KT77s over many of the re-issue KT88s (excluding high $ EAT KT88s), IF you like the EL34 type of "tone" but want a bit more sparkle too between EL34 and generic KT88s, may be worth it to looking into KT77s too along with other great tubes mentioned earlier.
whacky's avatar
whacky OP
53 posts
 
Wow

these are all awesome recommendations and definitely something I will look into. 
I was hesitant to spent the money on the SE tubes. Definitely had a few people recommend them highly after personal experience. But I love these other ideas as well. 
@johnss 
how hard is to replace the coupling caps? I’ll look into they tonight.  What’s the theory behind doing they? What do the coupling caps really do? 
Otherwise I’ll be checking out all those other tubes. The KT77. Tone plus sparkle sounds pretty nice to me. 
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