Rega, Thorens and Michell are great places to start. I am not sold on the Apheta cartridge. You certainly do not want to go cheaper. All three companies use very acceptable tonearms which will support any level of cartridge you care to think of accept perhaps Koetsu which requires a heavier arm. Something like the Ortofon Windfeld Ti, the Lyra Kleos or the Soundsmith Sussurro would be nice. Go with a Sutherland phono stage. I would hope they would be less expensive across the pond.
If you had $12k / £10k to upgrade your analogue front-end...
Hi all,
I am upgrading my system in my listening room bit-by-bit. This room is for focused listening of music only. No movies. In the future I will be looking looking to upgrade my analogue front-end and am thinking of a budget of around $12k / £10k for a turntable, tonearm, cart and phono stage/pre-amp. I listen to all sorts of music from electronic, bass-heavy vinyl, jazz, hip-hop, rock (new and old), ambient (Cinematic Orchestra, Nils Frahm etc...) and lots of soul/funk type tracks. So quite varied.
If you had $12k/£10k to spend, what combination of turntable, tonearm, cart and phone stage/pre-amp would you go for? I'm looking for suggestions to help with my research. I'm unsure what the balance should be between them. For example, should I go for a Rega Planar 10 with Aphelion 2 cart (£6,840) and give myself just over £3k to spend on a phono stage. Or spend less on the cart (Rega Planar 10 with Apheta 3 is £4,950) and get a more expensive phono stage.
Turntable brands I've been thinking of are Rega, Clearaudio, Technics, VPI, AVID, Thorens, Michell Engineering, VPI, SME etc... but don't really know where to start.
Any help would be much appreciated.
- ...
- 76 posts total
@lohanimal good analogy, thank you.
|
cannula: I was suggesting starting with a new/different cartridge (only) fo a start. A cartridge with a bit more detail and jump factor may be all you need. Your TT is reviewed as being slightly smoother than typical non-suspended decks in its price range and above (not a bad thing) and your cartridge is reviewed as being somewhat "static" sounding (probably not a great match as you are looking for a more exciting sound). It’s easier (less confusing) to change one thing @ a time and sometimes that one thing is all that’s needed. Years ago I was looking @ new TT’s and CD decks because I was not happy with the bass/mid-bass of the one’s I’m still using. The Thorens/SME had a hollow/reverb quality and the CAL (CD) was a bit thick/mushy. During the course of the search I added a couple of after market custom shelves (ordered months before) to my rack for the source gear. Doing so remedied what I disliked about the sound of both and I ended up keeping them (the improvement was so great on the CD deck that I ended up selling the DAC I was using as I discovered that with the new shelf I preferred the sound of the internal DAC). Changing one thing (the shelf) was all that was necessary.
DeKay
|
@dekay Gotcha. This makes perfect sense and could actually be a really good interim solution. Any advice on a cart I should look at that would go with my table, tonearm and the Moon Ace? |
Sorry no... The last time I listened to newer cartridges was around 2010 and they were a couple of inexpensive Denon MC's popular @ the time. I have 20 year old Grado Prestige Silver/Gold bodies, an old lackluster Ortofon 15 something which sounds similar to the Shure V15 MkIV mistake and an excellent sounding (but ancient) Pickering V15. I require very high output due to the way my line/phono preamps and power amps are configured. I have an old EAR 834 hi-gain phono preamp which would remedy such, but it needs some work that I've never gotten around to. I've found pro reviews of the MP-500 interesting (in regard to breaching the MM/MI/MC barriers), but there are many choices out their. The MP-500 is "said" to have some of the attributes of better MC's, but it also has a user replaceable stylus for approx. half the price of the full monty.
DeKay |
- 76 posts total