Hi Manny,

No worries, mate. Those little regulator valves do make a difference, sonically, and the English Electric one is the best I've heard so far. Let me know what you think when yours arrives.

Interestingly, since you've bumped this thread, I've just won a nice matched pair of pretty rare NOS La Radiotechnique ECC83, from 1959, one of which will be used in the Croft's power supply:



As you can see they've been measured on the seller's valve tester, and they're not only matched, in terms of output, but both have perfectly balanced triodes! Hard to find like that. Not the cheapest at £190 for the pair, however, but these are top-notch and amongst some of the best ECC83/12AX7s available.

La Radiotechnique was the French arm of Philips Holland, who also owned Amperex and Mullard. Therefore, these tubes have a plate structure similar to Amperex Bugle Boys, which are renowned in tube circles, but many consider the RTs as superior (and rarer). These ones were released by the French Army, where aside from being tested, have been sat at the seller's premises since 1959 - and now they're winging their way to me!

Marco.