Best Phono Pre for Teres

Bebop,

I guess you didn't read my post on your thread.......... I have an Airy 3S w/silver base (.24mv) running into an ARC reference phono in my system. It sounds incredible. I am using Hovland MG II phono cables which are a big improvement over any others I have tried including: Nordost Quattro, Kimber, and Audience. The ARC actually has enough gain from it's MM input (which bypasses the internal x-former) for the Airy. It sounds a little better in this configuration to me (a bit more pure if you will, but it's really, really a small difference, and I like the MC input for some more powerful Rock stuff as it's a little more dynamic in the bottom).

I have not heard the IO or Manley, but I did borrow a Whest from a local dealer recently. I much preferred my ARC in almost every way. The Whest was quieter though.

Hope this helps, it sounds like you have a fun decision to make.......... It's a bitch trying to decide what top flight phono pre to get to go along with the rest of your rig......... which is one of the best.

Chris

Dear friends: Especially who cares about music/sound reproduction, not who cares about sound reproduction.

All of us put a lot of money ( thousands dollars ) and time ( overhang, VTA/SRA, VTF, Azynuth, vibration devices, cartridge/tonearm match, and the like. ) to extract all the MUSIC information that was recorded on any single LP: we take really high care about that, and for what? if latter that signal goes inside a tube device that destroy it!!!!! or even worse: inside a step-up transformer ( it does not matters if this SUT is an Expressive Technologies ) and then to an additional tube device stage. This does not have any common sense.

All of us know that a tube device generate his own harmonics: THAT DOES NOT EXIST ON THE ORIGINAL SIGNAL ( and other limitations, like: heavy degradation of the sound at the frecuency response extreme. ). So, what we are hearing through a tube device?: not even a picture but only a: bad CARICATURE. We need, at least, a good picture not a caricature. I know that many of you loves that caricature, but this is not the issue..

Somewhere, in the time, we have to analyze those things that happen with a tube device and that goes against the music/sound reproduction and try to do changes on our audio system for the better.

I know that almost all of you are in love with the tube devices for the phono preamp, I asking you why? if you love the music.

I'm not against the tube devices " per se ", it is only that is imposible to have a good all tube phono preamplifier because the physics laws do that the tube devices unfit for. No body can do nothing about.

If any of us wantt to have a great music/sound reproduction through a home audio system is a must to have the right tools to do it and only the right ones.

Regards and enjoy the music.
Raul.

Regards and enjoy the music.
Raul.

Jafox, I agree with your comments 100% regarding the relative importance of phono vs. line stages and interconnects. For whatever reason, the line stage just seems to put more of a stamp on the overall sound of the system than the phono stage. Likewise, I have found that the most critical interconnect is the one from the line stage to the power amp. Common sense says that the earlier cables, especially the tonearm cable, should have a greater effect since there is so much gain after that point. But facts are facts. The final interconnect always seems to have a greater impact---positive or negative.

Bebop86, As for your query re AudioNote M7, I recently had the privilege of using the AudioNote M7Phono stage in my system for a couple weeks. Most of my listening was with the AudioNote SFZ transformer. There is no question but that the AN sounded very nice. In particular, it had a way with vocals that was unique in my (limited) experience: smooth, detailed, dynamic. I have never before found it so easy to follow individual instrument lines without conscious effort. But my final conclusion was that my two DIY tube phono stages with Jensen step-up transformers were more satisfying, at least in my system and for my tastes. While not as seductive in the mids, my home-made efforts are more satisfying in the bass and treble, and are more coherent across the spectrum.

To be fair, the AudioNote gear will probably shine more brightly in an all-AudioNote system.

I think anyone considering products that aim as high as the M7, or the IO-Signature, or the Lamm, etc. really must audition them first to make sure your listening priorities match the designer's priorities.

Best of luck.

Raul,

In response to your post on tube gear (and please know I am not trying to start an arguement, as I have always found a good deal of insight and wisdom in many of your other comments on Agon). I have been a professional musician for almost 20 years, I play acoustic and electric guitar. I have extensive experience in the recording studio and mixing live sound in numerous concert venues. I can only say from this expereince I would rather eat nails than play my guitar through a solid state amp. Further some of the most coveted and respected studio gear ever made uses tubes in it's signal chain. The recordings that many of us love from the 40's-present day have been recorded with tube microphones, etc.

I am not an electrical engeneer and don't mean to hijack this thread but for my tastes I feel that tubes are a critical part of my experiences in sound reproduction. Whether playing my Stratocaster through my '59 Fender Tweed Twin, recording my voice or acoustic guitar in the studio, or playing Louis Armstrong back on my home system.

Like I say, I'm not trying to start a fight here, but IMO and I'm sure many others tubes rule!!!