Advise on Long Phono Cable run

I cut and pasted an excerpt from the description on the Manley Laboratories website, written on their phono stage model, Chinook.  I own one and can speak highly of its sonic performance.  In fact, it's the best sounding phono stage component I have ever owned (having several over the years past).  My turntable is 8 feet from my main line-stage preamp.  I have the Chinook located just below the turntable, with the phono connection being the standard 1.2M length.  I use an Audioquest cable run of 3M from the Chinook to my line-stage preamp.  There is absolutely no trouble running that length.  Zero noise, no loss of signal strength, fabulous sound.  I am running a modest output MC cartridge of 0.6mv, which is a Lyra Delos.  Anyway, this setup works very well and sounds wonderful.  Read the paragraph below and then log on to the Manley Laboratories website for further information.  I hope this helps you.  Good luck on your quest.

Like the Steelhead, each channel employs the two triode sections of a 6922 for amplifying duties with highly accurate passive RIAA equalization networks. In the Chinook, the signal is then directly coupled to another 6922 dual triode serving as the output driver in a White Follower configuration. This output stage circuit is our favorite because of its super-low output impedance and beefy current-driving capabilities. It can drive long cable lengths and difficult loads, tube or solid-state. Bring it on. No wimpy cathode followers here!

Dear @jagjag : It does not matters the type of cartridge you can use it, with 5m. cable from the TT to the Halo RCA phono inputs you will have a " severe " cartridge signal degradation especially at high frequency due to the cable resistance and what you say can happens about that the very low signal is way suceptible to be contaminated rfi/emi and the like no matter waht.

Now, my next advise depends on the importance that the LP listening sessions has to you and how often you listen to LP and even how many LP's you own  and if LP is your main listening medium ( I doubt it because your Halo is not precisely for analo but....) then that TT must be nearest to the Halo ( no more than 1.25m. ) and the other electronics/speakers at " long distance " from the Halo because are all high level units including the signal to the speakers and the Halo output impedance is low enough for you have not problem down there other that all the money you need for the overall system cables you have to buy.

The other solution is that you buy a true balanced phono stage and connect it from those 5m. through the Halo balanced input.

Regards and enjoy the MUSIC NOT DISTORTIONS,
R.

The interconnect cable from my TT uses balanced xlr connectors. It was wired that way at the factory. Almost all cartridges are capable of balanced output. My cartridge has a rated output of .44mV. TT is currently in a temporary location so for a stop gap solution I'm using about 10m of old beat up, cheap, coiled up mic cable. Good strong signal to the pre, (which is fully balanced) no noise and not enough signal degradation to notice unless you were to do an A/B test.

You should be able to have your TT interconnect rewired to balanced easily and economically and be good to go as long as your phono input is also balanced. 

A true balanced signal is the way to go for long runs. Period.

The problem here isn't that the length, so much as it is capacitance! Even with a balanced connection, the physics are a bit different than it is with a microphone; the capacitance of the cable and the inductance of the cartridge make a tuned circuit with a resonance. Over 5(!)meters, the capacitance will be significant regardless of the cable, single-ended or balanced, such that the resonant frequency will be quite low. That will in turn make for problems with many phono sections if the resonance is even outside the audio band. With MM it will be **in** the audio band and make a mess of things.


If you can't find a compact phono section with a balanced output, I would get a single-ended phono section that can otherwise do the job and have it drive a line transformer which can convert from single-ended to balanced to drive the long run. Most high end audio phono sections that have a balanced output don't actually support the balanced standard, and as a result will be unable to drive a length like that.


But if you use a line transformer you can pull it off. This would be best driving a balanced input at the line stage; if that's not available you'll need another line transformer to convert back to single-ended.


If you do it this way the long interconnect will not have to be expensive yet will be sonically neutral.