Nkonor, I would ask Manley regarding other changes between the v1.0 and v2.0 of the Steelhead. The layout is different, in addition to the motorized volume control, but I don't know about anything else.
Doshi Alaap is quality for sure. My only beef would be in theory, because it uses 12AU7s, the sound of which I have always disliked, compared to many other twin triodes of similar characteristic, especially the 6SN7. Never compared Doshi Alaap to the Steelhead. I bought the Steelhead for totally pragmatic reasons, rather than based on listening tests. It has the features I needed for my Beveridge system, and I only knew by reputation that it would be very good, which it is. I have plans for some tweaks to the circuit, though. I had an Aesthetix Janus for a while, also very good ONLY after upgrading the coupling capacitors, but I like the Steelhead a tad better.
Anyway, I don't think this discussion is necessarily about what is the "best" phono stage, and I am making no such claim for the Steelhead. There's another thread for that. I knew that my suggesting that the Atma-sphere and DSA were unique in offering balanced phono inputs would bring out the names of some others that also do. I will say this: the DSA is truly unique in its offering 3 really discrete phono stages, each with its own separate gain and loading controls, on one chassis. They are really separate modules. That would be very hard to achieve with tubes.
