I've been there, back again, and there again.
I started with a pair of ANUK step-ups, moved on to a pair of Altec 4722s from EIFL which I used with my old Shelter 901. Later I got two different sets of Jensens, and the much-ballyhooed Stevens & Billington TX-103s which I then put into the Bent Audio Mu enclosures.
At that point I acquired an Aesthetix Io Signature, and all thoughts of using a step-up went out the window. From using inductive loading, sometimes combined with extra resistors either at my phonostage or at the transformer primary, I went to using no loading at all, and became an apostle of the all-active MC stage... all active tubes up to 80 dB (phono section alone)! I was plagued with RF (you can see many of my old posts on this topic), but I had achieved crystal-clear well-water sound rippling out of my speakers... the Io Sig opened up my records like nothing I'd ever heard before.
This despite the fact that some people say that low-output MCs HAVE to have step-ups... that they were designed for that kind of loading. This might not be true of all modern LOMCs, but my cartridge fetish in recent years has been for various flavors of Ortofon SPU and the revered Denon 103 and 103R.
So one day my friend, who had been clamoring to do so for months, brought over his Shindo Monbrison all-in-one handbuilt tube preamp. The Monbrison has a built-in phonostage of high repute. It even has a built-in hand-wound amorphous core step-up for the MC input, optimized for the SPU. WOW!!! Dead silent, 3 huge boxes (including my BAT linestage) replaced by one, small, dark green one, built like a jewel. I sold my 3 boxes the next day and ordered a Shindo Monbrison from my dealer, and haven't looked back.
When I play my Denon cartridges, I use the Auditorium 23 step-up optimized for the Denon, and it's pure music. My SPUs go into the built-in MC input on the Shindo. My Denon 102 (for mono) goes directly into the MM input. And I've never been happier.
So I guess I'm back in the step-up world. But you need really really high-quality iron. And you need to choose a transformer that is perfectly optimized for your cartridge (remember that when they first marketed the MC, in the form of the SPU, it came with built-in transformers in the massive headshell... SUT matching is the key, because you need to match gain and loading perfectly, and you cannot adjust it, and it has to be high-quality to boot). Nothing against active loading - everything in the audio world depends on the implementation, and I have nothing but respect for the Aesthetix way of doing this. It's just that I've found a way - an older way I guess - that produces even more music with 66.6% fewer interconnects, a lower electric bill and more peace of mind...
Patrick
