Phono Stage upgrade to complement Dohmann Helix One Mk 2

Dear @mijostyn : "" has way more features than I will ever need or use. It looks beautifully made. It's "Hum and Noise" spec is very misleading. "Equivalent input noise below full output 22 Hz - 22kHz: - 137 dBu." I have no idea what that means. "

Yes, me neither and about the spec figure I posted because you posted before the same kind of noise figure for the L20 and that's all.

In the other side and talking of the L20:

" By virtue of his feeling that digital RIAA correction is superior to analog filters "

With today digital technology I agree with him. You can outperform easily RIAA deviation accuracy in the digital domain and you can " do " anything you want it with digital that you can't in analogue because you have to pay the " price " doing in analogue.

Problem with inverse RIAA eq is that the anlog lovers just can't digest that the beloved LPs be listened through a DAC in the phono stage. A really complex whole audio industry issue for say the least.

R.

I, for one, would welcome the opportunity to audition a top quality phono stage that does RIAA in the digital domain.  There's nothing inviolate about the precision capacitors, resistors, and/or inductors that are necessary for accurate RIAA in the analog domain. But I need to hear it.

Still wondering whether Mijo directly compared the Hyperion to the JC1.  I owned a pair of JC1s and ran them on my Sound Lab speakers before I later made a major change to the SL input circuit.  In the original configuration of the SL crossover, my Atma-sphere amps had a tough time with the very low impedance offered by the old SL crossover at midrange frequencies (2 ohms minimum at about 2kHz and only 5 ohms at around 500 Hz).  Also, the resistor in the hi pass filter sucked amplifier power at those very frequencies.  In that condition, the JC1 had no problem, but I did not care for the overall gestalt. (This goes back to Dover's statement that you choose an amplifier to suit a speaker; I totally agree.)  The JC1s were better suited to drive the old SL backplate than were my Atmas, in the midrange.  When I later modified the crossover drastically, I eliminated that impedance dip, and the Atmas sounded far better than the JC1s.  Just my personal experience. Presumably, drbond owns SLs with the later revised version of the crossover, which was implemented by Dr West in response to this same problem. I can say nothing about the sound of the Hyperions; I never even saw a pair.  But the JC1s are good but not transcendent, in my particular experiment.

@lewm  : You can listen the Devialet  audio electronics. I don't know if today still handled phono stage unit but I heard it and was really good.

Exist other manufacturers that have a digital RIAA in its design.

Btw, the today JC is really different to the old ones and every body knows that you are married with tubes in that specific sytem link. Nothing wrong with me.

R.

Specifically, I have found that I favor OTL tube amplifiers to drive full-range ESL speakers.  This category does not include conventional transformer coupled tube amplifiers.  Why add another coupling transformer where it is not needed? A further qualification is that I made my original judgements based on ESLs that were available in the 70s and 80s, to include KLH9s and Quad 57s, and a few others.  Later on in history, several speaker makers, SL included, made a decision to design crossover networks or input stages for their ESLs that made them a more favorable load for solid state amplifiers.  I have not liked such speakers as much as I liked the early high impedance ESLs, whether driven by tubes or by SS amplification.  For another example, the very first M-L ESL, the CLS, with a 16 ohm impedance, was made in heaven for the Futterman amplifiers I then owned.  I enjoyed them for several years. Then M-L messed with the input stage to lower impedance for SS amplifiers, and the resulting CLS IIs lost all the glory of the original, regardless of how you drove it. I am very happy having removed the crossover parts from my SL speakers that wasted amplifier power across a resistor and that artificially lowered input Z to favor SS amplifiers.  I am quite happy with what I have now in my PX845s, and I commend Dr West for modifying his speaker line in accordance with solving the problem they had.  I plead guilty to all of the above.  Now, will you admit that the very thought of a vacuum tube makes you have conniptions?  The JC1s plain and simple do not hold a candle to the Atma-sphere amplifiers I own for driving my current version of the 845PXs; if they were better sounding, I would have kept them.  Believe it or don't.

Enjoy the Music reviewer on the OP model:

"  The company claims that the speaker requires only 60 Watts to perform to its high standards, though my experience sheds some doubt on the usefulness of this figure. The Pass Labs A-250 Class A amplifier, which was otherwise a tonally wonderful match for the speaker, was unable to control the speaker's bottom end satisfactorily. In this regard, the Merrill VERITAS mono-bloc amplifiers at 400/watts a side proved far more to the speaker's liking. "

At the end really don't care about because I don't own those speakers but I listened and are very good ones.

R.

R.