Has anyone compared Rogue RP-7 to Cary SLP05 and / or Audio Research Ref 5se?

Okay.

I mean I wasn’t saying that mine sounded horrible with the EH tubes in it, I’ve always thought that it sounded quite good. It was just that when I got a chance to roll pairs of 6SN7s & VT231s in the balanced input sockets I did hear some differences, and depending upon which pair I was rolling, the differences were dramatic. Air and detail (which, if I am not misusing the term, made the imaging better). However, I am cognizant that this may not be what everyone is looking for in a preamp, but in my smallish listening room combined with the stuff I like to listen to, it seems to be my cup of tea. For right now, anyway.

Way back when I got my V12, Cary was sending them out with Ruby tubes.

@garyalex 

Yep, The Perfect Sound… that is it.

I just did a quick search & I guess that is a nonfictional work?

Did Hongo get into which tubes it was that he used that screwed his amp up?

he does say what tubes. I am on vacation or I would look it up.

Put this in your browser: the perfect sound garrett hongo

To be honest there are some enjoyable chapters sharing his enthusiasm and nearly out of control obsession for audio (I can relate to this). There are also some boring uninteresting recounts of his life and that of his fathers (yawn). Skipping that stuff it can be fun. 

As I recall Garrett had purchased a pre-owned Airtight ATM-2 amp.  He decided to use a pair of Tung Sol 6550’s in place of the Russian KT 88 pair the seller had included.  The 6550’s died on the first power up.  Apparently the problem was that the tubes couldn’t handle the start up voltage of that amp.  Replacing a fried resistor and the tubes solved the issue.