Found my GE 6550A NOS tubes..what do you guys like for 6550?

[Kapo_Polenton]

These are supposed to be the cat's ass of NOS 6550's. I remember being told when I bought my JCM800 that there were extra NOS tubes with the amp that weren't installed. I dug them out and noticed they were GE 6550A's. I'm going to be putting these in the amp over the weekend but it made me wonder, what other more cost effective alternatives are there out there? I like svetlana EL34's in my Marshall style amps, seems like there is less to choose from among 6550's. Given what everyone knows about how most companies rebrand their tubes, what have you guys liked? I hear a lot about these wing SEDs which are about 40$ more expensive than svets, tun gols, EH, sovteks etc.. what's the scoop?

Think 2204 for my base amp/tone reference.

 

[Kapo_Polenton]

I guess I'm the only one who rolls with 6550's? Guess this is a 6L6 / EL34 crowd!

 

[Anonymous]

Nope...I too am a 6550 fan and user......SED

 

[acalaf]

Definitely winged c for 6550's. Probably the best sounding tube of all current production tubes of all types.

 

[glpg80]

Penta Labs and Tung-sol reissues are great 6550's. Gold Lion's also get my personal vote for KT88's but you said cost effective and gold lions are on the opposite of the spectrum lol, almost $60 a bottle.

Not a fan of ruby 6550's, their top end is lacking to my ears - sluggish or not as defined as others.

JJ and electro-harmonix are others worth mentioning in the cost effective range but i have not had a chance to mess with them. I disliked JJ 6L6's with a passion and have bad reliability experience with electro-harmonix so i have not been too keen on trying either of these out anytime soon.

 

[fek]

I had a set of Ruby's and still have a set of Tung's. I like 34's myself so neither stayed in my RM100 very long.

I didn't really spend any time listening to the differences between the Rubys or Tung's but I love the winged C 34's I have in there now.

 

[Laura]

I love those GE's also. I have heard good things about the Valve Art 6550's but I have not tried them yet. I special ordered some for a client and he preferred them to the SED's which really shocked me. I tend to prefer KT88's also and the SED's sound great to my ears. I still need to try the Gold Lions also. I have a bunch of guys who just love their KT77's but I am big bottle fan typically.

 

[thegame]

These are supposed to be the cat's ass of NOS 6550's.

They are. If yours have good life left in them, any new production 6550 will sound and feel somewhat sluggish compared to them IMO.

 

[Kapo_Polenton]

I was looking at the cost of these online and the GE are 300+! I should almost sell them for 250$ and spend 100$ on SED's and never know what I'm missing. That is what i "should" do but of course I want to hear what I am missing so I'll pop these in this weekend..

 

[TeleBlaster]

Sovtek