But after this final test with another EBC3, I need to drag a conclusion. Before doing that I wanted to return to one of my all times favourite combos, Philips 4654 with ITT Lorenz E88CC. I wanted to compare Philips EBC3 with ITT Lorenz E88CC on the same setup. I love both inputs with this output, yet both have pros and cons.
So now we have another elephant in the room. Is EBC3 better than a very good newer school E88CC? What makes them different because they are somehow close to my preferences in sound. I will try to explain the differences I hear, even if this is very subjective. ITT Lorenz E888CC is a very musical tube, relaxed with a kind sweetness. It complements very good the technical sound of the 4654 by adding some musicality while remaining fairly neutral. Mids are an idea elevated and sweetened, but much less that what the british tubes are doing. I love this sound, technical yet natural and smooth, close to what I would consider a lively presentation without any fatigue. Sounds good right? But well, what does EBC3 has to do with this? Well, EBC3 keeps the same transparency of the E88CC and remains fairly musical while sounding richer. It is mode vivid, sounds more like the old Philips sound. It is a fairly bright tube, mids are somehow too poor for me, less musical than E88CC but the highs and overall presentation is somehow similar. A plus to the EBC3 is the richer more vivid sound of the old Philips tubes, a plus of the E88CC is a more musical midrange. All in all, both are incredible tubes, but if you will ask me to choose, I wil still choose Philips EBC3 because that rich vivid sound, even in a brighter signature, is immersive somehow. It captivates you and makes you want more. This is the beauty of the old Philips sound, the true hi-fi sound as I liked to call it several times, its beyond the signature, so you can feel it in several tube types even if those are sounding totally different. We speak again about a house sound? Maybe, who cares. I'll ask the monk about this since it's Friday Beerday.
And another conclusion is that while I want to listen more to EBC3, I feel that ECH3, ECF1 and EBF2 were not on par with this one. All were close to each other, the same pentode veiled sound. Much warmer, much lower gain sound, so you have to amplify more with your amp than with your tubes, but lacked transparency and dynamics. For sure, not bad, but not on par with EBC3. And this leads me to a change of plans, I will not follow these but I want to go towards EF1/6/7 and see how those perform triode strapped in input of Eternity. Gain should be decent, around 36 for EF6, let's see how things go. Tubes are quite expensive (over 10 EUR/piece) but maybe I'll try some. I have to admit that my trust in B-code tubes is low, I would prefer some WIRAG A-code tubes in input because I find them more transparent that the usual suspects. We will see.