Jim, I would trust your ears on this new tube! You have a proven track record finding tubes that have that unique magic that brings life and realism to music! I’m very interested to see how this one progresses!
Thanks Jesse for your Trust! However it's early days exploring this new tube, at least to me. I received a note recently from a follower in Europe and he said Tube Amp builders in Eastern Europe have known for years that this is a great sounding tube and a good driver as well! I'll be do further listening tests this week as soon as a more powerful filament SMPS comes in. A pair of the 6N6P-I surge to almost 5A at 6.3v on start up. The new power supply is rated for 5A so it should be able handle that. I'm also going to bring in a Gold grid version and see if I can hear a difference.
Thanks for you videos as always! The NEVZ plant to my knowledge was in Novosibirsk, not to be confused with NEVZ Novocherkassk (a locomotive plant). I'm surprised you're surprised: the 6N6P (the standard, not the pulse version) has a reputation of quite possibly being the greatest preamp and driver tube of all in some former "behind the iron curtain" countries. I have an amp in which it's used as the driver for the GM70 transmission tube (the Russian end-all version of the 845).
I've heard very little about the tube and going way back with Google shows only a small handful of hobbyists working with it. Much of the online talk must not be in English, same problem with Japanese tube designs. But even if I'm late to the party I'm happy to have discovered the tube!
Really interesting tube. It is actually a small power tube kind of like the 12B4A but with two sections and easier to drive due to higher mu. You could parallel the two sections and get very near a triode connected 6AQ5. Very flexible.
Exactly and most importantly it sounds great in my standard Preamp configuration. Not to mention that it is big, tall and sexy! I'm a sucker for tall 9 pins with nice full chrome domes. Years ago visuals didn't matter at all, because tubes were always hidden inside cabinets. But I like to put them front a centre on the top plate of our Kit Amps. Now don't get me wrong, first and for most, the tube has gotta sound good, be available for reasonable money and be reliable, the visuals are just a bonus!
@@tubelab194 And then there are those voluptuous Coke bottle tubes. :D P.S. is there a particular reason you chose RC coupled cathode bias for the CF as opposed to direct coupling or voltage divider bias?
@@mkshffr4936 Yes, I tried various CF bias methods, but it took a week (in my spare time =0) to find the one I presented in Tube Lab that worked perfectly for both the 6n6p and 6n6p-I and sounded great. The schematic is available as a Free download in the store and is under an Open Source liscence as well. I still need to do some more critical listening, and that will start this week with the arrival of a 5A SMPS to power up the 6n6p-I, which has a start up surge of 5A! It quickly settles down to 2A, but my 2.2A SMPS wasn't able to handle that surge.
My personal experience is limited to a handful of small signal tubes that we use in prototype kit amps. And of course we only choose to design amps around great sounding tubes! Currently we work with E80cc, 12au7 (and variants), 6n1p, 6n2p and 6n6p. For the E80cc both of the more common types - philips and Tungsram sound great, 12au7 the best USA made version is the rca cleartop. For the Soviet 6n1p and 6n2p i love the voskhod tubes and the 6n6p was only commonly made by NEVZ factory and they sound great as well. For a tube to considered for a Kit it needs to meet our electrical requirements in circuit and have a low distortion, clean and clear sound. Sometimes a tube will bring some additional special sonic quality and we of course welcome those unique properties. Good examples of this include the 6n6p which has a very full rich midrange and the rca cleartop which has amazing clarity.
Dear Sir, I'm new to using tubes in amplication. May I ask is there a real real sonic difference to the 6N6P versus the ECC88 VS-Rocket tube? Thank you
@@tommythe-datnguyen9572 you really can't compare the Soviet 6N6P to 6DJ8/ECC88, they are completely different tubes and in most cases won't be used in the same circuit. The soviet 6n6p is a unique tube with no direct Western equivalent. A better question would be, how does the Soviet 6N23P compare to the ECC88, the reason being they're very close equivalents. And the answer is very favorably, though until you try it in your actual circuit/system you won't know how it sounds.
Thanks so much for your response. My phonostage (Octave Phono Module) uses the stock 6N6P tube in the variable output stage and a 6N1P-EV in the output buffer stage. In the manufacturer manual specification it indicates ECC88, 6922 or 6N23 can be used as alternatives. For this reason I'm curious as to how the alternative tubes will sound compare to the stock 6N6P and 6N1P tubes. Do you have a view?
@@tommythe-datnguyen9572 all those tubes your manufacturer listed are either the same tube or very closely related electrically. There's no (zero) point discussing the sonic differences of a tube like the 6n6p for a circuit it can't be used in. Now in circuits designed for the 6n6p, the tube sounds very neutral with a nice fast response and works excellently as a gain, driver and cathode follower, and has enough power handling it can even be used as a power tube in an OTL amp. Caution!!! The 6N6P is a powerful tube and should not be substituted in circuits not designed specifically for it or you could damage your amp or worse start a fire!
"That's booooring..." You have a tube nerd channel, tube data sheets aren't boring to weirdos like us. ;-) By the way, the "pulse" is likely the EMP pulse from an atomic blast.
Thanks for the comments! I had actually thought the 6n6p-I being rated for EMP, but did some more research and apparently some types of tubes are subject to pulses in circuit. That made more sense to me, but your idea has merit as well. I'll consult with my friend who is a retired electrical engineer, who was trained when the only option was a vacuum tube, so he has a depth of knowledge that goes way back. He's probably forgotten more than I'll ever know!
@@tubelab194 Yeah, I suppose it depends on what it was used for. I'm a bit rusty on Soviet era tube minutia but being a child of the cold war when I thought of "pulse" in regards to a cold war era Soviet tube I thought EMP. Maybe we can refer to it as "electrically ruggedized".
@@georgeswanson9483 true, it's always possible it can handle both situations. I just consulted with my Friend and he immediately thought the same thing EMP. I have some contacts among my Ukranian tube wholesalers, I'll ask them to read the Russian data sheet and see if that will help solve this wee mystery.
There was a case in the 1970s were a soviet fighter jet landed in the hands of the US military. When they analysed the control and navigation circuitry they noticed that a combination of solid state and vacuum tube electronic components were used. Initially they were amused at the use of vacuum tubes only to later learn that the vacuum tubes were used in critical control systems. This was deliberately done by soviet aeronautical and aircraft engineers to protect systems from the shock generated by nuclear blasts that would normal fry solid state components. The used micro Vacuum tubes which were a lot more resistant to nuclear blast shock waves
I consulted with my Ukranian wholesaler and he doesn't know what the tubes were made for, but it's starting to look more and more like the pulse rated version was capable of surviving an EMP. It's scary to think engineers were seriously considering the possibility.
You mean using the tube in an OTL headphone amp? Great question and we already looked into this. The plate resistance of the 6n6p is 1.8k /1800r So you would need 6 tubes per channel (1800/6 = 300) 12 for a stereo amp The heater consumes roughly 6w (12 x 6= 72w) 72w just for the heaters, is a wee bit hot but 12 tubes would be on the very edge of what is practical. Now a pair of 600 ohm headphones would only require 6 tubes and that's getting more practical.
@@lupoal4113 I've experimented with a SRPP preamp design and consistently found the circuit made my vintage tubes microphonic, so I abandoned the circuit. In my experience simple circuits generally work best and sound best. Every time I get all complicated the sound degrades. I think the minute you leave the path of a simple circuit you introduce things like feedback, phase shifts and other unintended consequences that all degrade the source signal. That's always our priority when designing a circuit - preserving the source signal.
