Ignorance is bliss. Sort of glad I don't have a tester, as I think there would be much anger within me from seeing the results.
Their customer service is literally pathetic. I'll never buy from them.
Thanks for the heads-up.
Vacuum Tube Snake Oil Salesmen
Just a mini rant to complain about vacuum tube suppliers (not all but most) and their false advertising.
I ordered a set of 4 matched 2A3 Acme tubes direct from PSVane for my Woo Audio WA33 as an upgrade. They cost close to $1k all together.
When I got them I checked on my MaxiMatcher2. The boxes said 65mA but with correct operating voltage and bias set on the tester I could only get 2 of them up to 43mA. One other read 39mA. And the last one was an internal fault short which could have damaged my amp had I not checked them.
I asked to return one "Matched" set for replacement. The PSVane customer service would only offer to send me one tube and not a matched pair. They would not pay return shipping to return one set. Instead they demanded I smash the bad tube and send them a picture. Has anyone ever smashed a large vacuum tube with a hammer and seen where all the pieces of glass fly to? I said no way. I will throw it out or return it but I am not going to risk cutting my hand doing that. So they refused to send a replacement.
While I had the Maximatcher out I decided to go thru some other tubes I had in my spares box to check them (purchased before I had the tube tester). I could not believe the results. Some tubes matched by well known vendors were off by as much as 30% from each other.
It is really a good investment to get a tube tester if you will be a regular user of tube amps.
If you must buy PSVane then get them from Amazon and not direct so you have some safety to return them.
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@thecarpathian - I've bought NOS from a very reputable dealer and when I put then in and turned them on, it sounded like gunshots, and I turned the amp off in a hurry. Sent them back, got another pair of the same kind, same thing happened, and I just got a refund. On the other hand, I've got Ray Reserve 6SN7's and put them in the same amp and no problems at all. I like NOS tubes as well, and have a number of them, but it's a bit inaccurate to imply that there would be no problems with them while avoiding fully tested and matched tubes like Ray Reserve. |
@marco1 +1 "private online sellers of …. tubes are really the problem." I have good +++ experience buying tubes from https://peavey.com/product-category/accessories/misc/tubes/ I had issue w/ one tube of bunch short, and Peavey sales sent me new good tube immediately! |
Isn’t it the same golden-ears who routinely experience stunning improvements from rhodium fuses and $1000 Ethernet patch cables who also presumably run grossly out-of-spec tubes in their gear, yet notice nothing? "I paid $1000 for a pair of EL84! They must be the best EL84s in the world! You get what you pay for!" Indeed you do.
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