Anyone who owns a Technics SU-R1000, can you answer a quick question


I’ve been getting familiar with the new SU-R1000 for the past couple of weeks and I’m thrilled with it so far. Selling all my other gear, sounds amazing, couldn’t be happier and all that jazz.

But I am wondering if anyone here who owns one can answer a question about the phono preamp noise floor?

Stereophile measurements appear to be impeccable, but I hear a definite noise floor in the phono pre, even when the source is turned off. It is a hiss that is inaudible until the unit is turned up much beyond 40 on the volume knob.

I have swapped out my Pure Fidelity table with my Technics SL-1200, optimized both cartridges, and both have the sound. When the amp is muted it mutes the sound.

It is not audible on any of the other inputs.

So if anyone else has this preamp - could it be mine has a defective phono pre input, or is it just a higher noise floor?

128x128jsqt

Thanks, the SU-R1000 has an “Intelligent Phono EQ” which calibrates the gain, phase, and cartridge optimizer which is supposed to set the proper impedance based on the calibration. So in using that feature, there is no manual entering of gain or impedance settings, it is all optimized for you. My cartridge is a Pure Fidelity Stratos which is a LOMC cart, but the audible noise floor is there when the phono DSP is engaged or not. 

@jsqt-

Sorry- meant to ask did you run the optimization with the calibration record that is provided with the receiver?

There are threads on Agon regarding this unit- I didn’t read them but seems like there are others that may own this unit. 

@designsfx yes, I did do the calibration and the effects are definitely audible so that’s working. The noise floor is there regardless of whether I engage the calibration DSP or not, but after working through the weekend on this, I think it’s just that the gain is so low on this input that I’m having to turn it up to where the noise floor is audible.

The sound overall is exceptional but it’s so much quieter than my Line 1 or USB inputs, there is like a 10dB difference between streaming and the phono pre.

Technics’ lack of customer support was a concern when I bought this thing and now I’m thinking I’ll have to give them a shot regardless. My hope was that there are other SU-R1000 owners on Audiogon that can verify their experiences with the unit.

If there’s something that is wrong with the phono pre input on the unit that would suck. I did test this with my MM Ortofon Blue cart on my SL1200MK2 (also calibrated with the LP) and the gain was also quite low in this case.

In both cases I had the "MM" or "MC" set properly. There is a way to add 3dB of gain to the phono pre input but that defeats the calibration setting/optimization.