Step Up Transformers….Are they Worth the Trouble?

btw, for bang for the buck mc, I don’t think I’ve seen a single review that wasn’t a rave for the Hana Umami Red. Kat Ourlian, who was at Upscale but now reps SME in London, called me when she heard I was ordering a Koetsu.  As I recall, she seemed to be gently pushing me towards the Red, I think in part because my suspicion is their experience working with Koetsu was not perfect. But she’s been a huge proponent of the Red from the day it came out.  One other random thought while I’m rattling on, I met the UK rep of Gold Note in an Austin record store, and he was really high on their cartridges (i know. surprise!).  But since then, that’s another brand that seems to punch way above their $ weight.  (Btw, I have some experience with the brand - both their DS10 dac and PH1 phono stage are in one of my systems, and they’re superb).  What Gold Note and Hana have in common is that before their brands were started, they were OEM producers for other brands.  So that’s why I think they tend to be lower-priced than some of the competition - they’ve cut the middle step out of the supply chain.  

@mdalton IIRC Sugano Sr. also used a Fidelity Research arm on his Garrard. Even "just" my FR64fx and 64S are stunning with Koetsu (I have 6 lol) - and I ended up liking them better with all my other brand cartridges, too (ideal mass compliance matching be damned). Modern arms end up sounding a bit "dead" to me.

Your Reed should be awesome anyways (have a friend who recently got one), just saying :)

Your room and system are absolutely stunning btw - and that blue Garrard is almost beyond this plane of existence

Dear @lalitk: I started to post in this thread in the page 2 and from there I was the only person that touched that " equilibrium " not one but 4 times, here the other 3 that confirm I'm in agreeing up on even that no one posted:

" don't try to help the OP and they do not like to analize the whole subject in objective/subjective equilibrium.  "

" Objectivity and subjectivity in equilibrium is the name of my audio " game ". "

" hand tested each part, we don’t let nothing at random everything was measured. Along those chasing " numbers " we made really hundreds of listen tests in several room/system and always testing with the same LP tracks. "

@lalitk obviously that you know that 0.4 db deviaiton in the RIAA of your integrated and that number ( for an SS unit.) is unaceptable but been the design of the 650 was not main focus the phono stage because it's an integrated unit where normally designers look to the amplifier design.

Btw, and after rea ldozens posts by youin the thread you showed not aminimum minimum EQUILIBRIUM. Objectivity just does not exist for you because goes totally againts what you want and these are facts.

R.

@mulveling 

Thanks! Yeah, it’s a cool room even before the tubes warm up, lol!  Love your stuff - I see you’re rocking Hashimoto HM-7s - feels like I’ve stumbled into another good decision with my Swissonor SUT…

@mdalton

I just looked up Swissoner’s HM-7s retail, wondering what’s sort of wizardry commanding such a steep price? I remember seeing an outlet in US with similar Hashimoto tranny’s for lot less.