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Yamamoto HSA-01 headshell/head amp

During my recent trip to Tokyo, I happened upon this gadget. It is a headshell with a built-in gain stage that boosts signal voltage in the ratio 1:14. Apparently this is achieved via a tiny op amp and battery power, both seated in the base of the headshell, behind the phono cartridge mounting area. The beauty of the idea is you can thus boost the signal of a very low output LOMC right at its source, before it has had to travel over connectors, tonearm wires, more connectors, etc, to reach the first stage of gain, be that a head amp, SUT, or high gain phono stage. The op amp is designed to drive a 47K ohm input resistance and is thus suitable for MM stages or a low gain MC stage in which the load is 47K ohms. The net weight is only 12.5g, making it somewhat compatible with even high compliance very low output cartridges. I wonder if anyone has experimented with this gadget. I am about to do so myself.

lewm
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rauliruegas
13,103 posts
 

Dear @lewm : You are rigth today op-amps are way better that the ones in the 80’s.

I’m with you that bougth it more by " curiosity ".

 

" will be a revelation ". I think not because it has very limited frequency range ( I can’t understand why is that but was what Yamamoto choosed. ) and you don’t know its levelnoise that I magine should be low but we don’t know.

Normally headamps has a frequency range from 0.5hz to over 500khz and some -3db at 1Mhz, this is another history and not a " open door " for this thread.

 

Yes, share with us what you experienced with.

R.

lewm OP
13,222 posts
 

If you say so.  But I personally would not call flat from 10Hz to 100kHz "limited".  If you use -3db limits, then perhaps the bandwidth is much wider.

stereo5's avatar
stereo5
6,441 posts
 

Can someone please tell me what a SPU cartridge is?  I know it comes mounted on a headshell but what am I missing?

dogberry
690 posts
 

@stereo5  see here https://ortofon.com/collections/spu-series

lewm OP
13,222 posts
 

Stereo, you ask what you are missing. What have I written that has anything to do with an SPU, which cartridges are an Ortofon product?

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