12au7 tube?

@signaforce + 1 on the 60s Brimar, cv4003. Use them in my DAC & much preferred over many of the other usual suspects. I believe the 50s Brimars are even better but good luck finding a pair south of $500.

@audiojan Nice selection of tubes. Enjoy!

@decooney 

I bought a preamp that came with a bunch of extra tubes.  One of the selling points was six brand new PSVANE 12au7 tubes that were still in perfect boxes with Viva stickers on them.  I put in the first two and within 72 hours one of the tubes started making crackling static noises. I put in another set and the same thing happened after about a week.  I put the set in and in about 12 hours it started again. Over the coming weeks I played with different combinations using a Telefunken that I knew was good and when all was said and done, I had only one PSVANE tubes that worked! That’s when A, I  started buying matched set of New Mullard, Gold Lion, Tungsol and NOS RCA and Amperex tubes. All worked great and I waited two weeks with each before trying the next set.  I settled on the RCA Cleartops and they’ve been in a few months now. And B, I sent emails to PSV and Viva. Viva said because I didn’t buy them I was out of luck.  And PSV kinda blew me off as well.  A couple of weeks later I read an article saying that PSVANE had put out a batch of 12au7 Art series tubes that were bad. Again I sent emails mentioning the article to PSV and Viva and still they won’t budge!  So that’s why I will never buy PSVANE tubes again and I will never buy from Viva again.

Oh and I misspoke on my original post.

It was the Tungsols that came in second place, not the Gold Lions.

@curiousjim ...A couple of weeks later I read an article saying that PSVANE had put out a batch of 12au7 Art series tubes that were bad. Again I sent emails mentioning the article to PSV and Viva and still they won’t budge! So that’s why I will never buy PSVANE tubes again and I will never buy from Viva again.

Transparently - something very similar happened for me. Had everything to do with the tubes being lightly packed, loose boxes, no foam or peanuts inside. Same seller, and they were Gold Lyon, not PSVANE. Got a refund, thankfully. Crackling and snapping and popping in the first 1hr, and tried again like you - several times. Had been down this same path with other tubes, but something in common I found.

There is a whole other thread about this, and I’m challenging the distributors and reailers who unbox from Asia, and then test, and not put foam or peanuts and all that back in - leaving the tubes LOOSE inside, rattling and bouncing during shipping. Even the leaders at PSVANE are aware of poor re-packing/shipping issues. And they seemed to have fessed up a bout some batches that went bad  a while back, told me "poor QA". This next - Not sure what your case is - but I’’ll mention this if you need it. This can helps if you suspect poor repacking to you. 

You have another option. I just got a pair replaced, direct from the factory. They are going to ask you to share intel and photos and will want you to physically break the tubes to replace them - send them photos back of it all - in order to get replacements. Contact PSVANE direct. Try it, they were good responding to me. Took 17 days to get replacements. I’m using my 6SN7 replacements now, no issues, were packed really well too - fingers crossed for you., https://psvane.co/pages/contact-1