What's A Good Upgrade From A Manley Steelhead?

@dhcod and @goofyfoot Thanks for the suggestions. Two units I’ve heard little about so I’ll do some reading…

Actually the ASR unit piques my curiosity as it’s battery powered. My preamp and power amps are also battery powered and I like what that brings to the sound. Has anyone here heard the ASR? Thoughts?

cheers

I had the ASR and I liked it better than the steelhead. it was my favorite solid state, way better than the EAR 324. It takes up a LOT of space. I also don't think it's in the ballpark of the Lamm. There's just something special about their products.

@rooze I have the top tier ASR Emitter Exclusive II amplifier and then the ASR Mini Basis phono amp. The sound quality and build quality of the amplifier is a dream. The smaller phono stage is very good and because I only use a mono dedicated turntable, it currently meets all of my phono stage needs but at some point, I do hope to move up to their Basis Exclusive. Also, ASR customer service is directly with the designer and business owner himself. I have emailed him a number of times and he's always gotten back to me right away.

I have the ASR. It's fantastic. I bought it a long time ago because of the battery and being totally balanced. DEAD quiet!

Dhcod, you are certainly entitled to your opinion, regarding the superiority of the Lamm phono stage over the steelhead. My opinion is different. I have heard them both, and I do think the steelhead is a bit superior, although not by much. I certainly think the question is debatable, and not a certainty. A few things to keep in mind regarding the Lamm phono stage are as follows: it uses an internal step up transformer for moving coil gain levels. And maximum gain is 60 DB. The step up transformer has a 1 to 20 step up ratio, so you must take care to use it with moving coil cartridges that have a very low internal impedance, 10 ohms or less is advisable. Second, it has a rather high output impedance of 2800 ohms, I think. Or certainly in that ballpark. That means one ought to be careful about mating it with a downstream line stage, although most linestages would probably work OK. The Steelhead has three pairs of phono inputs and does not require a step up transformer in order to accommodate moving coil cartridges with low output. The total net gain is 65DB, so a little higher than the Lamm. Further the Steelhead has a built in linestage and costs a few thousand $$$ less than the Lamm. like I wrote earlier, in my opinion, the major factor that holds back the steelhead from being as good as it could be is the mediocre coupling capacitors used at the output, which are easily upgraded. With upgraded capacitors, I think one would find the steel head to outperform the lamb, clearly.