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Tubes wearing down - LD MKiii

post #1 of 5
1/13/12 at 11:31am
Thread Starter 

So I'm on the market for an amp to go with my newly acquired HD650s. I'm on a somewhat tight budget and I'd like to try a tube amp. However, I've been reconsidering the Little Dot MKiii. I was well aware that tubes have a finite life, but since I listen to music *a lot* and would use the amp with my computer, it means I would spend several hours a day pushing sound through it, sometimes for 6+ hours at a time with music, movies, skype, game sounds... I listen to music while I write papers all day and such...  

 

Seems like maybe I would wear down the tubes quickly. I know there's no straight answer for how long tubes last, but I wouldn't want to go through much more than one set of tubes a year (roughly $60?). Is this a realistic expectation at all?

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post #2 of 5
1/13/12 at 11:40am

Your average preamp tubes last about 9000 hours and your average power tube lasts 5000 hours.  Of course, there is considerable variation.  Some tubes never seem to die, while some tubes live a short life.  These are at least ballpark figures.

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post #3 of 5
1/14/12 at 1:01pm
Thread Starter 

Ok, I've been looking though, and I can't seem to find any matched power tubes for anything under $50ish to Canada, is this normal, or am I not looking in the right place?

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post #4 of 5
1/14/12 at 1:07pm

This is a Canadian based company.

 

http://thetubestore.com/

 

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post #5 of 5
1/14/12 at 1:19pm
Thread Starter 

I'm not sure how to navigate on that website. I guess the MK3 can only use 6H6P or 6N6 tubes, http://thetubestore.com only carries 6H6P ones but they don't seem to be matched - and seem only to be found through their search engine.

 

Hehe, with the holidays right behind us, maybe I'm being too ambitious. Too broke for replacement tubes -_-

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