This is basically my first post lads, be easy on me - I've coupled together my thoughts about the PSVANE CV181-TII tube. Note that my musical tastes revolve mostly around faster paced metal (sometimes melodic), modern and classic rap, as well as some classic rock. This is a decently wide spread of sounds, but maybe not as wide as the rest of you lads.
I picked this tube off
taobao, as an upgrade to my cv181 treasure (psvane describes this as an improvement to the full range sound response with no loss in soundstage or flavor) - I've burned this in for at least 300 hours now
I can only really compare this to the treasure series CV181, since the only prior tube I had in here was the stock 6sn7.
First off, the tube construction feels just as solid as the treasure, the pins look about the same material and quality. the only real difference is that this tube actually fits into the lyr3 - the treasure required a socket saver, or a lot of forceful pushing coupled with hopes and dreams.
Soundstage honestly feels a little more limited, by a small degree, only really noticeable with tracks with a wide echo, or recorded in a concert hall
the low end sounds much tighter and more responsive, particularly in sub-bass, while the upper end of bass response sounds just as good as the treasure
the mids sound a touch more pronounced than the treasure, if not on par - I'm still having difficulty comparing the two - they might be exactly the same for all i know
the highs sound much better, more crisp, more responsive, a tiny bit less forgiving - though running some tracks with background hiss through the PSvane does clear them up nicely compared to a SS source
So is this tube worth the $65?
I think so, since these are modern fabrication, dealing with new old stock isn't an issue. The QC from PSvane is good (I hear) and in my case, my tube was top notch - Though I'd look a little deeper into the topic if you're looking for matched pairs or something
From my research, the team that designed the original treasure series cv181 split off from the company and moved to psvane to work on this project, gradually improving it. If you want to support the makers of the original treasure, I guess buy this one, as the original company still owns the rights to produce the old treasure tube
anyway, here's a pic of it in the Lyr
thanks for the read