Linlai E 6sn7 tubes


I just placed an order for a pair of these for my Aric Audio Motherlode II.  I’ve been chatting with a fellow that runs the E 6sn7 in his Don Sachs pre. He loves them, He says they make his NOS tubes sound thin and lifeless.  
    It will be a couple weeks until I receive them,and I was curious if anyone out in Agon land has tried these,and what are your impressions?   
Thanks in advance,

    Ray

rocray

@rocray  on the flip side, the Premium Box set of PSVANE CV181-TII (6SN7s) tubes arrived today.

27 days to reach my doorstep in the USA, ordered from a large overseas distributor. Surprised the package arrived undamaged after many station scans, transfers.

A little taller and slightly wider at the base compared to the TJ Full Music 6SN7s.

Shows tested 10/9/2021, a little over 5 months ago, likely distributor inventory.

Starting burn-in now, hearing changes in the first four hours already. Interesting.

Hi @decooney, congratulations on the tubes. Please keep us posted as they burn in. How many hours do the Psvanes require? 

Hi @rocray Not sure at this juncture, and its because of how these tubes sounded in the first 45 minutes and the next 6 hours brand new. I’m more use to the sound being kinda strange first 2-20 hours on new input tubes like this.

First, I’m wondering if these were pre-burned in 72hrs or something like that. I doubt it, but they almost sounded too good at 6hrs of run-in time last night. So much so, that I don’t want them to change any more, hoping they stay put as-is.

Trying not to pre-judge them yet, they are too new, will try to run them in some more evenings this week and a lot more next weekend. I’m comparing them to my NOS Sylvania 3-hole black plates,  TJ Full Music 6SN7s, and generic TS re-issue 6SN7GTBs as a very wide baseline to compare to. To be fair, I’d need to buy a set of Linlai too, maybe later this year on those. Will do.

@decooney, thanks for your feedback on the Psvanes.  It will be interesting to hear how they stack up once broken in,but I’m guessing you like them very much at this point. 
          I have about 95 hours on the Linlai’s. I’d be pretty shocked if they were to change drastically in the next few hours.  I still haven’t put the KenRads back in,but one thing that these offer up(to my ears) is realism in tone. Stan Getz sounds like he’s right in front of me.  The tone is full bodied,and bass is tight and deep. They also get cymbals right. They have the right “ting” and “splash”. As you can tell,I’m not a writer,or musician.  I’m really looking forward to more folks getting some ear time with these.

 

           Ray

@rocray Good to hear. And @decooney good to hear that you’re evaluating the Psvanes. I’ll be watching thread with interest.

This thread is causing my "need to increase my backup supply of tubes" addiction to rear its’ ugly head again. 🤨 I don’t need more 6SN7s. I’ve got a pretty good supply. But there’s always that nagging fear of missing out. After all, I never bought any of those so-called WE 6SN7 plus tubes, which were very highly rated, and they became unavailable. Neither did I every buy any of the various versions of the CV-181s, and they’re very highly rated, too. 😕 I’m almost afraid of trying either the Linlais or the Psvanes. If I like them I’ll want another pair as backup. Geez! Not to mention the fact that I also run 300Bs in one of my amps and know there are a lot of good sounding options out there for those, including the Linlai options. 🤔