Frank Dresser wrote:



That's a good point. I buy most of my tubes from other sources, but I
usually check with my AES catalog first, just to establish a sort of
baseline.

The best service I've had came from Triode Electronics, but they don't stock
many radio tubes.

http://store.yahoo.com/triodeel/index.html

I've also had excellent results from ESRC, Fair Radio and Brent Jessee
Recording. Actually, the only less than excellent result I've had came from
AES. I ordered some new 6X8 from an AES sales flyer, and it turned out that
a couple of them were obviously used and the box and tube brands didn't
match on one of the used tubes. The used tubes tested weak as well. I
didn't bother complaining, because the price was good, and tubes which test
weak usually work OK.

I got most of my tubes in used bulk lots.

Frank Dresser


I've even had some good luck on e-bay. Often the price
of a fair-sized mixed lot will be so low that even if
25% or so are duds, the net cost is still much lower than
the on-line vendors. As long as a tube you want doesn't
overlap with the audiophool market there's a lot of cheap
stuff out there.