Tube Basics 101: What is a rectifier tube for?

Zmanastronomy,

"Affended"? Have a dick-tionary the next time you apologize.

Thanks Palasr and Elizabeth. Thats exactly the sort of information I'm looking for.

Trying to decide which tubes to replace in my preamp and which will give me the biggest bang for the buck. Lot of people wax poetic about the sound quality from swapping rectifier tubes, but I was also gathering that in practical terms the difference in sound from these tubes is less significant. I appreciate your no-nonsense info Elizabeth.

As far as the other tubes in my particular preamp, the (2) 6SN7 are both listed as drivers for the line stage. For the phono stage I'm a little less certain. I dont know which is the driver or even if one is a cathode follower. I may have to contact the manufacturer to find out.

Since you might be able to help, the preamp is the new Modwright LS100: http://www.modwright.com/products/17

Here is a little blurb from the designer as it appeared in a review on 6moons.com. Perhaps this would help determine which tubes are drivers/cathode followers:

"About the 6SN7 double triodes, we use just one half per channel. This gives the advantage of extended tube life as you can channel swap the tubes to use the other two halves. Theoretically we could have used a single 6SN7. In the case of our phono board, we do use a single 12AU7 and 12AX7 for two gain stages, again half a tube each per side."

You hit the nail on the head in that I really want to know which tubes will affect the sound more, and therefore which tubes to swap out first. Of course, my next question is going to be which tubes I should replace them with? NOS or current stock?

Kick a man while he's down.

Nnck,

Here is a link you may find informative....
A taste of tubes

Jea48,

Thank you for the reference. I never saw that wonderful article. Clever and informative. Thanks!