Now for the verdict: (drum roll) The e83cc, IMHO, in contrast to the JJ ecc83s, is several orders of magnitude better for fidelity. For a completely subjective, if schmaltzy opinion, there's a bit of magic in that bottle. The e83cc has finesse that the ecc83s simply lacks. Don't get me wrong; the older JJ is quite competent, but the new frame grid has a practically holographic sound stage, in terms of width, depth, and height...delightful really. None of my other current production tubes can touch it. There's more detail, and bass response seems to be about the same or perhaps a bit tighter than the ecc83s. After rolling all of my current production 12AX7 through this morning, I have to correct something I said earlier in this thread - this is not the quietest tube of the bunch. The quietest honors go to the Sovtek LPS. With my ears to the tweeters, I just hear tape and or amp hiss. The older JJ comes in at a close second place for quietness - just a minute amount of noise in addition to hiss. The Tung-Sol is only slightly more noisy than the JJ, but the frame grid is the noisiest of all. With ears to the tweeters, there's a hashy static present. Again, I can not hear it from my listening area. Given the superlative playback, I can live with the noise. I remember being perturbed at having spent nearly $80 for a trio shipped from Canada, for what at the time, I thought was a tube that was littler better than JJs other short plate offering. Today, I think it was a great investment. They are twice the price of the ecc83s, and to me, well worth it.
For noise, my amp might be a worse case scenario: My V4 bass and V5 treble AF amp tube sockets are microphonic. I replaced all of the components on V3 through V5 but actually made the problem a bit worse. Five new QQQ sockets await. But that's another story.
