How good is a Cary PH302?


Hello

I have a Cary 302 and would like some input on how good or bad it is. I am from Australia so I don't have much opportunity to compare phono stages.

I have the upgrade bug and have been eyeing on amps from Artemis, Tron, mod wright etc.... All of these amps are not much more expense than the Cary, but they all seem to have a great fanbase.

Am I going sideways with the above options or are they a Huge improvement?

I was thinking of upgrading mainly because I would prefer a bit more fain for my zyx .24mv cartridge. Another option I was thinking was to buy an external sut.

Thanks for any advice.
128x128petng
I have owned both the Cary and the ModWright. Hands down the MW is a far superior unit,especially with the internal power supply upgrade which enables this amp to read very deeply into the vinyl source. On the other hand the Cary unit is very "flat" but not a bad amp,it does have a nice,rich sound. The customer support from Cary is just the worst i have never experienced. Never have i experienced such an unwilling bunch of people to support their own product. Even a personal handwritten letter to the president and owner of the company went completely unacknowledged. I am embarrassed for them. I would never own another Cary made product and i owned two at one time. ModWright is just the opposite,you will not be out in the rain with them,holding a broken umbrella like i was with Cary.
I have auditioned the Cary PH302 and liked it very much. I have no experience with the Modwright. Also, my dealing with Cary's customer service is 100% opposite with Jazzcourier's. I found Cary to be very customer friendly and very supportive of their products. I would go as far as saying that Cary is one of the best in the industry for customer support.
TO: Petng.

If you are serious about a phono stage, look no further: Go with the ModWright. I own this unit for almost two years now and I am very please with it, and I listen to my system almost every day. Before buying the ModWright, I auditioned SAP phone stage, Graham Slee Era Gold, PS Audio, and the built in phono stage in my McIntosh C2200 pre-amp. None come close to the ModWright, it is just solid. I am not saying the others are no good, but the ModWright is better for me. Another plus (Mentioned in another posting by someone else)is the service and support from ModWright: Second to none. My phono stage had the silver face plate and one call to them and I was able to to exchange it for for a black face plate at a nominal price. At one point I heard a hum coming from my system and I thought it was caused by the ModWright phono stage, I called them up and explained what was going on and they said I should return it. They tested it and did not find any problem with it. When it returned I still heard the hum. It turned out that I had two bad (intermittent) interconnect cables, that was a year ago. Since then no problem. The ModWright is a soolid unit.
Cam the modwright be converted to 240v by a techican, or does it have to be returned to the factory?

Overall I am happy with the Cary, but deep down I know having another 10db oh gain will decrease the noise floor level.

The Cary sounded terrible for the first week. Flat lifeless, no dynamics etc... I really eas dissapointed. But I found out that the lundhal sut needed a lot of hours to burn in. Deep down I thought it was BS!!! But I bought the cary so I had to suck it and see . Well it's been 5 weeks now with about 80 hrs on it and indeed the amp has transformed. It's owned up with great dynamics. The strangest thing is that it sounds a lot louder. I have never had any equipment take sooooo long to break on!

If only the Cary had the extra 10 db!!!

I'm surprised by the Cary customer service comment. I own 5 Cary pieces and any time I've had a problem, e mailing them or calling there customer sevice number has yeilded an immediate response. They have even called me back within an hour of my inquiry. They have a tech to answer any and all questions from, I think ,1 to 5 every day. I'm not affiliated with them just a happy customer
Billy from Cary audio somehow heard of my plight. He has contacted me directly and has already asked one of the engineers at Cary to come up with a solution to give me more gain.

That's great service! I never thought of contacting Cary USA because I had bought this in Austalia.

Will keep you guys posted with the outcome,