Anyone Here Ever Purchased A Tube Tester?

While it's nice to know how strong a tube is, it even more important to test for internal shorts .   I always test the filament and test for shorts before checking emissions.   

For that reason alone it's worth having one if you have several pieces of tube gear.    Don't use your Amp as a tube tester

I have a TV-7 and 3 other Hickoks.  The only drawback to any of these vs the Amplitrex, Etracer, and Maximatcher is the relatively low plate voltage applied to power tubes is insufficient for matching.  In a recent test of rare 8417 tubes, I used my 539B, which allows plate current monitoring.  After recording the data for each of 12 tubes, I took them to a friend's house who has a tester with up to 500 v on the plates, and meters on every element in the tube.  Over half of the theoretical matches my 539B predicted were wrong.  The TV-7 and similar Hickoks are fine for preamp tubes and detecting shorts in all tubes, but for matching, you need a higher plate voltage.  I'll probably get an Etracer kit at some point.    

viridian

KISS.

I purposely avoid knowing stuff, so I can make decisions that are 'good enough', like a simple tester.

If it sounds damn good, like my Sony xa5400cd player I got with help here, I don't want to know about anything else, unless it breaks. I probably would just buy another xa5400 without even looking at anything else.

I had a big Hickock, and the Jackson I mentioned, never went beyond shorts/strength/matched strength? Big, took more space, heavy, not easy to take to a friends house ...

After 'little accurate 157' simple short/strength answers were ALWAYS the same, I gave both the Hickock and Jackson away to friends.

I have a LOT of used tubes, hundreds, some of them actually new. I test them before giving to friends, or using myself, a few for the 2 Fisher 500C's I'm going to sell if I overcome my reluctance to ship.

I'm between NYC and Philadelphia, perhaps I will try pickup only. 

Another way, compared to buying an old tube tester, is buying a new one, tailormade for you. I did, some years ago - Beck RM-1 tube tester, made to order by Helmut Beck for the 8 main tube types in my system. A quality instrument with great support from Beck. Very easy and quick to use. But limited - it only measures emission, not the noise level of the tube. Yet I get some info on the tubes (more or less 'strong'), relevant for matching and evt replacing, and I avoid putting bad tubes into the system. Recommended.