Siemens EL 34

Try checking with fellow audiogoners pdreher and clio09.  clio09 is now RAM Labs and a great guy very knowlegable.

FYI, there is a Quicksilver Audio group on face book and an EE audiophile there who used to work for QS about 30 yrs ago remarked this about his new KT monos:

KT Monos w KT170s is what I’ve been running for the last 5 months and I’m loving the match. One thing I can say is that you must experiment w bias level. It seems that the KT150s are more forgiving on bias setting. Surprisingly to me, the difference appears in the upper mids and highs and not the bass for the KT170s.

With high gain selected KT170s they can be run in the 60W Monos and that’s not such a great match. More listening to do, as always…

I'm liking the Tung Sol EL34B's that came with my Will Vincent ST-70 although I have nothing to compare them to - it's my first EL34 amp and I think I'm hooked on the EL34 sound.  Now if I could just forget about trying QS Mid-monos and be happy:)

decooney I don't own the KT88's I was forwarding some comments as per my 1st sentence...sorry for the confusion.

FYI, there is a Quicksilver Audio group on face book and an EE audiophile there who used to work for QS about 30 yrs ago remarked this about his new KT monos:

Now back to my comments - I'm enjoying Will's amp - it's the first EL34 amp I've owned besides an original Rogue Cronus Magnum that was tried and sold pretty quickly.

Hi decooney I have his ultralinear version and have Tannoy Stirling GR's which are an easy load and are a great combo (rig posted here).  35wpc seems to be plenty.  I still crave more of a triode sound like the Cary SLI-80 F-1 I had years ago and wondering if the mid-monos would provide that since they are 50% triode driven.   

Thanks decooney for all the valuable info. Will and I did discuss his triode version but given my power requirements decided UL would be the better choice. It does get loud here sometimes:) That and I’d heard another ST-70 (Chris Keller’s version which he builds UL) in my system and liked the sound.  At some point I'll try some KT66's for a different flavor but overall it's a great amp.

decoony, no I have not tried them.  I'll probably play it as is for 6 mos. or so before I try different outputs.  Yes, I've ready somewhere that the Upscale Audio folks recommend KT77's as an upgrade in EL34 based amps.  

There's a minty pair of AES/Cary six-packs for sale on Ebay and craigslist not too far from my area - have you by chance tried those?  Too many output tubes for me but I've heard they're great sounding.