Elrog 300b's for sale. Your thoughts?


I noticed this morning an add for the new Elrogs.   I and many others on the forum ran the experiment when the Elrogs were initially launched.   We found the tubes to be superb sonically, but woefully unreliable.  In fact, the early failure rate on those tubes was apparently 100%.  I and others received replacements that were hand selected for suitability in our particular amps.  In fact one individual had 3 pairs fail.  In my case, I went so far as to purchase a PS audio power plant, having been assured that limiting incoming voltage to 115V would ensure reasonable lifetime for the Elrogs.  Two days ago, one of my replacements failed, after having been nursed along carefully.  Honestly, I doubt the tubes had 600 hours on them.  So the Psvane T1s went back in and I began the period of mourning for my deceased Elrogs.  This morning I awake to the siren song of an ad from a reputable dealer who is announcing availability of the new improved Elrogs with a 1 year warranty.   My initial reaction was, "I don't think so.  Someone else can run the $1200 experiment.  Burned once and lesson learned."  But here is the problem.  If all of Elrogs former customers take that approach, the new Elrog will also fail even if the tubes are good for 10000 hours, simply because no one will buy them.    The tubes are so good that it would be a tragedy if that happened.  So the question to all of you who have already been down this road is this?  What would it take for you to give these tubes a try again?
brownsfan
Hi Thomas, 
You have established a 5 year track record of Elrog tube dependability and minimal if any tube failures.  I applaud you for that and making a superb sounding tube reliable.  In hindsight it seems that the issue all along was poor tube filaments (Construction, design and quality) which were identified and corrected. 
Charles 
I'd like to hear directly from present production Elrog 300B users. Until I hear about direct experience as to reliability I can't seriously consider purchasing them.
I have a pair of Elrog ER00B about a year old and have had no problems, no noise, just beautiful sound. The only caveat is that I’ve used them lightly in my Vinnie Rossi LIO DHT so the LIO isn’t hard on tubes to begin with, I don’t have a lot hours on them and I no longer use the LIO.
I’ve owned Elrog 300B’s and TBH I feel they are overrated. Was disappointed during my ownership and felt the tubes were on the lean sounding side. I contacted Thomas Mayer and his response was they are lower gain 300B’s.
-Alex

Alex,
It just goes to show that no matter how good any particular audio product is it won’t please everyone. The Elrogs certainly were not lean sounding in my amplifier/audio system. The tone was full bodied and quite organic and alive in its sonic character.

Furthermore as stated previously some tubes are just better matches with some components compared to others. I’m pretty sure that there is someone somewhere who found the Elrogs too rich and warm in their audio system and as a result are disappointed .
Charles