Steakster, I tried a wide variety of 6dj8, 6922, and 7308's in my Eclipse; Siemens, Teles, Amperex, Mullard, all the usual "suspects". Not so much because any one of them sounded bad, just found it fun to do and listen for the difference. Believe it or not, the best OVERALL sound I realized was using La RadioTechnique 7308's. A bit hard to track down, but worth an audition if you enjoy tube rolling. May sound different in your system, though.
Tweakster, the Bent is solid state in the sense that it does not have tubes, I guess. It is a transformer-based passive with neither tranisitors nor printed circuits (except for the optional remote control I chose for mine). It is true that you can build a passive rather inexpensively following a Radio Shack visit. BUT, and this is a but bigger than J Lo's, not with the same quality of components found in either the Bent or Placette. I am not sure if that is what Abex was meaning to imply, though it should be clarified. Apologies if this is not the case.
Tweakster, the Bent is solid state in the sense that it does not have tubes, I guess. It is a transformer-based passive with neither tranisitors nor printed circuits (except for the optional remote control I chose for mine). It is true that you can build a passive rather inexpensively following a Radio Shack visit. BUT, and this is a but bigger than J Lo's, not with the same quality of components found in either the Bent or Placette. I am not sure if that is what Abex was meaning to imply, though it should be clarified. Apologies if this is not the case.