Phono Stage upgrade to complement Dohmann Helix One Mk 2

Helix is one of the best I’ve ever heard.

@holmz

Thanks for sharing! Was the Dohmann HQ in Australia, or Bulgaria (as I just read a Fremer article about Dohmann, Schroder, and another sound equipment manufacturer joining together to form a conglomerate in Bulgaria.)

Yes, the alignment was tricky the first time, but I made all my mistakes on the Rega P8. I’ve only used the UNIDIN alignment on the SmarTractor, since I listen to entirely acoustic/classical/jazz music. Do you have any idea how the Baerwald or Loefgren alignment would affect the sound, if at all?

Thanks for sharing! Was the Dohmann HQ in Australia, or Bulgaria (as I just read a Fremer article about Dohmann, Schroder, and another sound equipment manufacturer joining together to form a conglomerate in Bulgaria.)

The outskirts of Melbourne.

Yes, the alignment was tricky the first time, but I made all my mistakes on the Rega P8. I’ve only used the UNIDIN alignment on the SmarTractor, since I listen to entirely acoustic/classical/jazz music. Do you have any idea how the Baerwald or Loefgren alignment would affect the sound, if at all?

Well, I opined that IMO the spindle distance and overhang are about the least important things to get right, but the Azimuth, rake and Zenith are hard… and people get over anal to the Nth degree on the easy stuff and can miss the important stuff… and he seemed to concur.
(We talked at length and I’ll be getting a WAM Zenith disc when the TT rebuild is complete.)

Anyhow… for instance with the CB-9, I plug in the 222mm spindle difference I get baerwald having the Schroder recommended overhang.
I am visually within 0.2mm of 222.

The I go into the calculator and use Loefgren and get a number a couple of mm different.
On a lark put in a spindle distance a mm error, and got an overhang a bit different. 1mm error in spindle distance is heaps.

So we can get anal on that to save a small fraction of a degree of error and then can miss say a cartridge Zenith error of a handful of degrees.
And SRA and Azimuth are also difficult, but less so for Azimuth.

This is worth a watch IMO:

My opinion is that I would not stress at all about it, but Baerwald is a longer effective arm, and I believe should be better overall… to an anal fraction of a degree… but I have not done the maths and graphs yet.

How does the TT sound?
I missed which arm and cart you put on it?

And @drbond I am a bit envious… but my old table is a thing of joy.

@sksos , my mistake. You really need to take a look at the Channel D Seta L 20. It is the quietest phono stage made, is battery powered, will do both voltage and current modes ( your MSL will really sing) and has a flat output just in case you want to try digital RIAA correction and recording your friend's rare records.
@drbond , I also use a SmarTracter. The alignment to use is Lofgren B. It has the lowest distortion across the record accept at the very inner groove area. Modern engineers stay away from that area and even in the old days most records were not cut that far in.

Aligning a cartridge on the Sota can be a bouncy situation, I can't imagine doing it on the Dohmann which is even more sensitive and the entire plinth is suspended whereas with the Sota the suspended sub chassis is internal. Is there a way to lock out the suspension on the Dohmann?

@mijostyn I've been using the SmarTracter for the last 18 months (prior I used the  feickert protractor). As you know the SmarTracter has 5 different setting you can use to align a cartridge. When I first received it I went back and forth listening to all 5 settings and came away with Lofgren B as the best sounding "to my ears". It's nice to know I picked the one with the lowest distortion.  😎