Linlai E 6sn7 tubes

@lowrider57 The Linlai website does not grade their tubes, one could assume that their buyers should consider their purchase as having passed a Linlai quality control standard. That leaves me with my original concern that the tube I will be receiving may be of a lower quality even if it is a genuine Linlai tube, perhaps a Linlai "reject"? At this point I just have to wait until I receive it and listen to it, which, other than its reliability, will be the ultimate test regardless.

I have the Shuguang Treasure 6SN7s on my Don Sachs preamp. Don says in his website that these simply walk away from the holy grail NOS tubes. That's quite a statement.

Obviously this is not the case with all NOS tubes...as a lot of the culture that made these tubes is gone forever.

All of our customers that have installed some of these boutique tubes say the same thing- that the Psvane, TJMusic and so on have all the best qualities of the best NOS tubes without the weaknesses.

I can confirm that the Shugang plant that made the garden variety of 6SN7 burned down about 2 1/2 years ago. Also, FWIW every example we've seen of the Sophia 6SN7 has been weak. We've only seen them installed in customer equipment, and so far when asked no-one has said they were in the equipment for more than 6 months. So we think this tube has a defect causing a short lifespan; NOS tubes will last for years in our stuff.

So far the Linlai tube seems to be a better part. I'm hoping it has a good lifespan as I mentioned earlier; if this is the case the tube is a steal at its price.

Thanks for all the input so far folks.  

I just checked tracking. My tubes are in IL. Hopefully I’ll have them by the end of the week. 

@rocray please continue to follow up with posts on this thread describing your experience with these tubes.  Especially if you're able to compare them to some of the well regarded vintage tubes.