Cary V12 and other tubes

Stick with the EL34's. The V12's sound with the KT88's (Svetlana's) was bland and lifeless. Dynamics were also squashed and constricted. Don't waste your time and money! I still have the Svetlana KT88's with only a few hours on them just gathering dust! If you still want to experiment, contact me and I'll sell them to you cheap! FYI, the Svetlana EL34's are much better than the stock RUBY's. In my opinion, this is a much wiser and significant upgrade than fiddling with other tube types. Good luck!

Trelja, I concur. I was also puzzled by the result. I biased the amp exactly as recommended by Cary. A friend of mine has the V12i monos. He also tried the KT88's and arrived at the same conclusion. Another friend tried a set on his Jadis DEFY 7, the result was magical! The tubes he replaced were 6550's. I think I still have 10 matched pairs of Svetlana KT88's. Email me directly if you're still interested.