primer on buying vintage tubes?

Welcome to the dark side. Choose wisely. ;~)

There are some excellent new production tubes,
particularly power tubes like Gold Lion and Valve Art.
For smaller tubes like 6922 and all of the 12A*7
varieties, most people prefer older production.

The upside of dealing with someone like Brent Jessee or
Upscale or Jim Cross is that you will probably never get
a BAD tube. The down side is that you will pay top
dollar for every tube. There are plenty of reputable
individuals selling tubes here and even on eBay.

Use the same guidelines that you would if you were buying
a piece of hardware, check feedback and explore multiple
options. Google is your friend. Do searches on whatever
tube you are looking at.

Joe's Tube Lore on audioasylum.com is dated, but has good
information on the types of tubes that it covers.

If you can, make friends with somebody with more
experience. That's how I got in so deep.

You can contact me if you think I can help. The main
thing to remember is ENJOY THE MUSIC.

Thanks Bbroussard! Very kind of you and I may take you up on your offer! cheers!

Ebay sells garbage Vintage Tube Services sells the best and Andy is very honest.

I talked with Kevin Deal of Upscale Audio at the recent T.H.E. Show in Irvine CA, and found him to be VERY knowledgeable on the subject of tubes. He has an enormous inventory of them, so I would definitely give him a call.

The good thing about 6922's is that they have really long lives in the scheme of things. Usually 5000 to 10,000 hours. We all have our preferences but most prefer NOS. I agree with the comments about ebay.
Buying from here or audiogon is usually safe. Other good dealer such as upscale are tubesandmore.com and thetubestore.com. Sometimes echohifi has good buys. Some sites are fun to peruse but are way too pricey such as tubeworld.com.