Buzzing from speakers on TT rig

It was not a static issue but violent snapping popping as soon as you touched anything.

@mofojo 

This is very typical of an ungrounded phono setup. You mentioned that it occurs when messing with the phono cable too

Even through using only the MF phono input I can make the buzzing vary a little by wiggling the ground cable around.

- which suggests that the ground hasn't been made. Can you run a wire from the base of the tonearm to the chassis of the phono preamp? This would test that theory. Otherwise if you have a digital Voltmeter I would put it on the Ohms scale and measure for continuity between the bass of the arm (or other metal part of the arm) and the end of the ground wire.

If that measures nearly 0 Ohms then the phono section is suspect. If it measures much higher then the ground wire has a bad connection.

Great tip! Thanks very much, I will try it out tonight. 

Sure there's no routers or wi-fi nearby?

This certainly sounds like a ground loop issue, did atmasphere's suggestion work?

I moved to a new place a few months ago - and purchased a new TT to celebrate. I had an incredible amount of issues with what I had anticipated would be a trouble free TT, and assumed I should just have gone ahead and gotten the finicky belt drive rig.

My issues were very much like yours, it all started with a cartridge issue which I somehow made worse. For some reason, it decided it no longer liked the way it was grounded. And the interconnects that were fine yesterday are also an issue. I had one advantage in being able to quickly swap out cartridges which aided in my troubleshooting. I swear half the time it seems like voodoo.

I'll run through a few things to try - also don't discount the cartridge giving you problems. Is this both channels? Can you get it to change? A lot of times, you're going to get a slight hum/buzz at volume with an analog rig, but it shouldn't be noticeable at low volume.

Separate ground cable, interconnects and power as much as possible

Change out interconnects (they are shielded, correct?) and reverse

Change ground wire location if possible

Check cart wiring, reverse cart wiring (just to see if anything changes)

Relocate TT if possible - even 2' can make a difference

Unplug all of your digital gear and anything not needed

A lot of troubleshooting doesn't necessarily fix, but gives you clues that something else might be the issue. Also, does anything change? Meaning, is it quieter sometimes, noisier others? Do you have any sort of line conditioning?

In the end, my problem was 1) 2 new cartridges that failed in almost identical fashion, 2) needing a very well shielded interconnect cable (this was sporadic) and 3) relocating my ground location to phono stage power supply from preamp. Hopefully you've already solved it and it was your ground wire.

I don’t know if it worked yet or not. Didn’t get a chance to try cause of holiday BS. Will try some time this weekend. I did feel the ground cable coming out of the TT and feel it may be split inside the cord! Maybe that’s wishful thinking but shall see.