TonyNewman
Headphoneus Supremus
- Joined
- May 28, 2014
- Posts
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I shake my head at all the variants of new production very good power tubes and rectifiers, when there are none for decent driver tubes and I am absolutely not going to say anything about the Pis 181's. Whoever did that write up about how good they were a while ago in the press and preferred them to the TS or Brimars well one can only assume he had bumped into you mate lurking about with your side business !...
I have to admit some culpability here. Before I knew what a top driver sounded like I was quite impressed with the Psvane T2 CV-181s. In some ways they are impressive - balance, extension, detail, speed - they are superb - but they lack any hint of warmth or character. They make Sylvanias sound dark in comparison. They are so dry that they can easily drift into harshness without careful pairing with warm tubes. I got away with using them paired in the WA6/WA5 with the Psvane WE274B replica rectifier - a very dark tube - but pairing them with a more neutral rectifier (like the Brimar) would be about as much fun as stuffing your gonads into a bacon slicer.
Psvane got close with the T2 CV-181. If they could just add some warmth to the tube it might amount to something, as it is - no. Much, much too pricey for what it delivers.