Tubes Rule!!!! I use my 1070/Anthem MCA 5 II for HT and surround sound. I move the speakers wires for my Alons from the HT amp to my Vac PA100/100 when I want to listen to 2 channel music.

My Tube Preamp is the ARC SP16-L. The current production of Vacumn tubes for audio Sucks. The Russian and Chinese tubes do not sound good at all.

Back in the day, the USA, England, Germany, etc. make great sounding tubes for Audio.

I am telling all of you, should you use tubes amps/preamps, Dacs, etc, make sure you get tubes from the 1960's and 1950's and maybe 1970's.

There are NOS tubes that cost a lot of money. Try finding tubes that are litely used and test well!

For my Preamp, I use 1960's short plate Mullards make in the Blackburn plant. When I compare these to the EH 12AX7 tubes that came with the preamp, the decison with clear, Mullard kills the Russian tubes.

For my Amp, I use Tung Sol 1957-1959 5814A (12AU7) tubes. These are military tubes and they are warm and full, way better than the current crap out there.

Now I await some older KT88 output tubes for the amp. These tubes are so hard to find. I am lucky to have found some.

Modern amp/preamps with good transformers and good old great tubes give you satisfaction, unlike Solid State and Op amps!

IMHO , to achive good sound like tubes with Solid State, you will need to spend thousands of dollars.

Sad too say, the great names such as Mullard and Tung Sol are now owned by New Sensor and they put out lousy sounding , good looking Russian tubes.