sricabla
Full Member
I like the new format of Z-Talk
Posts: 138
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Post by sricabla on Jan 26, 2013 8:22:43 GMT -7
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Post by KeithA on Jan 26, 2013 10:12:36 GMT -7
I saw this yesterday. Neat idea, but seems to be a little pricey ($499 IIRC)
Keith
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Post by wayben on Jan 26, 2013 13:47:49 GMT -7
I agree, great idea and looks easy to use, but pretty pricey.
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Post by bluzman on Feb 2, 2013 15:29:44 GMT -7
I hope Myles weighs in on this...
This is a nice, simple and effective tool if it does the right tests. I have too many tubes over the last 40 years that need testing.
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Post by DRZ on Feb 2, 2013 16:30:23 GMT -7
I'm getting two units from Jake at Humbuckers. I'm a sap for new test equipment, especially tube test equip.
DR.Z
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Post by bluzman on Feb 2, 2013 17:31:57 GMT -7
^^^^^^^
Good enough for me...
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Post by English John on Feb 3, 2013 2:45:31 GMT -7
I saw this at NAMM, I was really impressed, shame it doesn't work with rectifier tubes as well!
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Post by DRZ on Feb 3, 2013 5:11:43 GMT -7
I saw this at NAMM, I was really impressed, shame it doesn't work with rectifier tubes as well! Your right about that John. DR.Z
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Post by Maddog on Feb 3, 2013 7:31:29 GMT -7
"A good piece of kit!" Do you guys really talk like that??? Hey thanks for the post. I think I'm gonna have to get one as well. I have an old tester, but I always wonder about its accuracy....you see, it has transformers, resistors, and capacitors in it which must be 50 years old. How accurate can that be? So is my tester worthy of testing? Maybe I need a tester tester....
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sricabla
Full Member
I like the new format of Z-Talk
Posts: 138
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Post by sricabla on Feb 3, 2013 10:12:00 GMT -7
I'm waiting for your reviews before I decide on consider buying it. The concept is great for anyone who has a lot of tubes that would need testing. I try to buy reasonably priced Mullards and RCA's. One time I bought a tube for a premium price, close to $100.00 and sounded great! Worked for 6 months and failed. I bought a Mullard on Ebay for $40.00 and it sounded just as good and lasted me 2 years and still working. I myself, just care if the tube sounds good and will perform properly. I'm not into the technical aspect of the tube of gas and plate voltage etc. Once you own the tube, that's it! You own it, no matter how good or bad that it may be.
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Post by doctorice on Feb 3, 2013 12:10:43 GMT -7
"A good piece of kit!" Do you guys really talk like that??? Hey thanks for the post. I think I'm gonna have to get one as well. I have an old tester, but I always wonder about its accuracy....you see, it has transformers, resistors, and capacitors in it which must be 50 years old. How accurate can that be? So is my tester worthy of testing? Maybe I need a tester tester.... i have couple testers also, Lee. They need to be calibrated. They work on rectifiers, iirc. But this Orange device seems very nice.
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Post by radarlove on Feb 3, 2013 13:48:23 GMT -7
Anyone know where it's made?
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ksks
Full Member
Posts: 120
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Post by ksks on Feb 3, 2013 15:27:16 GMT -7
www.orangeamps.com/products/accessories/amplifier-management/vt1000/If you go to the link above and view the slideshow, the rear photo looks like it says "Made in Turkey" Looks like a great tool for "go-no go" testing and matching. It would be nice to know what parameters it uses to assign the Matching Value, and where the cut off is for Good, Weak, Fail. EXAMPLE: 80%, 50%-80%, below 50% or whatever. Then again, maybe it doesn't matter... Street Price?
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Post by zdogma on Feb 3, 2013 15:35:42 GMT -7
I have so many old unmatched tubes, this might actually be worthwhile. I just checked and i have 22 miscellaneous NOS 6V6 tubes.
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Post by KeithA on Feb 4, 2013 4:02:22 GMT -7
My only fear is that the tube sockets are directly attached the a PCB. In the video, you can see the sockets moving when the tubes are being inserted/removed. So, I can't tell if the sockets are directly attached to an underlying metal case or not. I don't care if the unit is PCB, but I'd want the sockets mounted to the metal chassis and not the PCB. My fear is that over time the board would just break as one would be swapping a lot of tubes.
Keith
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Post by beauzooka on Feb 5, 2013 15:30:07 GMT -7
An interesting and nice unit. $500 is a bit spendy. I could not gather from the video how you can rate both triodes of say a 12ax7.
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Post by bluzman on Feb 5, 2013 15:43:37 GMT -7
At a quick glance I found that it tests both triodes but don't know about how to "match" based on results.
In approximately two minutes, the VT1000 performs an extensive series of tests including:
Heater filament test: Short circuit Heater filament test: Open circuit Heater filament test: Tolerance check Heater cathode insulation: Leakage Heater cathode insulation: Short Circuit Tests for heater current abnormalities Amplification factor Voltage gain Power gain Screen grid test Mutual conductance test Dual test for double triodes Emission Inter electrode leakage Inter electrode short circuit Flash-over (arc detection, high voltage breakdown) Gas ionisation test
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Post by doctorice on Feb 5, 2013 19:24:43 GMT -7
With all those tests occurring it would have been neat to have some readouts or display of the individual results in addition to the composite numerical rating the device displays.
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Deleted
Deleted Member
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Post by Deleted on Feb 5, 2013 20:31:07 GMT -7
I'm getting two units from Jake at Humbuckers. I'm a sap for new test equipment, especially tube test equip. DR.Z You know there'll be a run on 'em now.
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Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
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Post by Deleted on Feb 5, 2013 20:35:24 GMT -7
"A good piece of kit!" Do you guys really talk like that??? Hey thanks for the post. I think I'm gonna have to get one as well. I have an old tester, but I always wonder about its accuracy....you see, it has transformers, resistors, and capacitors in it which must be 50 years old. How accurate can that be? So is my tester worthy of testing? Maybe I need a tester tester.... Probably just needs a calibration from a qualified tech.
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Post by myles on Mar 1, 2013 14:28:27 GMT -7
Some folks wrote me about this around NAMM time and I gave them my take on it, cannot find what I wrote. In essence, without knowing the working voltages this does not impress me. It does not have a stout power supply so testing tubes for any sort of current capability is out of the question. It is too pricey in my opinion for a go nogo piece of gear. You'd be better off buying a tweed champ kit and using it as a tube tester. If sound comes out the tube works and if a tube is noisy or microphonic you could tell that as well.
Bottom line - this tells you, in a very expensive way, if a tube is burned out or not. I guess it tells you how it is burned out which is sort of pointless as it is after the fact not something like a gassy tube that may have a short life. It gives you no data so you cannot use it to check QA/QC of a tube maker or your vendor. You have no actual spec data to match, grade or measure tubes to compare to design spec. They supply some arbitrary data. In regard to power tubes you need a power supply capable of supplying high current and high voltage. Low plate voltage (Less than 250 volts) will yield results that are great for old radios but not for guitar amps. The internal power supply of this device is not capable supplying high voltage and high current.
Breaking down matching numbers to a 15 point scale is pretty crude. Not as crude as the ten point scale used in the past by GT and not nearly as useless as the low, medium, high scale used by Fender but pretty rough compared to folks that match within a milliamp or a few milliamps. As a side note, what is this rating based on? TC, plate current?
Bottom line .... I was not impressed when I looked into this during NAMM
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Post by markT on May 29, 2013 5:00:58 GMT -7
^^^ Thanks Myles
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