Tung-Sol 12AX7/ECC83

These tubes replaced V1, V2 of an Epiphone Blues Custom 30

The stock Tubes where old so the improvement of tone was audible. Stock Electro Harmonix gave me less output and more fizz.Tung Sols where loud round and clean. It is difficult to understand the sound when you read words like "more open", "3-D sounding", "Bright but Thick" but really there are not other words to describe. It has great clarity, it is bright but full. Blues Custom is a VERY bright amp but these tubes dont overflow it. It cuts through the mix well.

IN COMPARISSON WITH JJ ECC83.
Honestly the differences are there but are minimal. If you want to change the sound of your amp, different tubes aint gonna give you dramatic differences but slight different character. JJs seem a bit darker. JJ has the same amount of Treble but more low Mids that give the impression of darker sound. The Bass is also looser with JJ but Tung Sol thickens it nicely.

The comparisson test was in an Epiphone Blues Custom (where they stayed) and in a Marshall DSL20. Recorded with an SM57. When playing clean the difference is minimal and you have to pay attention to hear a difference if any. Playing with an OCD in Epiphone and with the gain Channel turned up in the Marshall the differences where more pronounced and are as described above.

I have Tung Sols in the Epiphone for about 2 weeks so I will edit my review in the future to comment on reliability.

It is also important to mention that Thomann delivered them to me securely, carefully packaged and they traveled a bit, so dont be afraid the transportation if you want to buy your tubes online

I replaced the original 12AX7 tube in my Bugera V5 with this Tung-Sol. I have also changed out the stock speaker for a Celestion speaker. The speaker upgrade made a huge difference because the original speaker was to mid range focused and a bit tinny sounding. So I thought, why not try changing the preamp tube also to see what happens.

The positive thing about the Tung-Sol is that it is quiet. There was much less hum and delivered more treble and gain.
The bad thing is that there was less bass and when I add gain just a little for distortion the upper mid's take over. It sound a bit like a distorted Tweed.
Some player will like that tone but I don't really like it so I reinstalled the original Bugera tube.
I don't know how useful this review is. What I can say is that this is a quality tube that does not add noise and hum.
I am keeping it and might try it for different things in the future. The things is that a tube might work in one context but not in another. And tone is always a matter of tase, is it not?