VAC Phono in Avatar Super

I would love to know how the Vac's phono stage stacks up against some of the well known brands out there.

I have demoed the VAC Renaissance (full-function preamp) in my system. I don't know how close the Avatar comes to that, but the Renaissance does include internal stepups on the MC inputs, so their topologies seem similar. The Renaissance is higher up the food chain of course, so take it FWIW.

In my system the Renaissance easily bested the Aesthetix Rhea/Calypso and its line stage easily bested a Lamm line stage. It was, in fact, the second best preamp I've heard. My Nick Doshi Alaap had slightly better frequency extension at both ends and was slightly clearer on digital sources, but the differences were not large. If I didn't have one of Nick's units the Renaissance would be my choice from all the commercial preamps I've heard.

Thanks for your input Doug. Mine sounds good but I don't have anything to compare it to. According to the VAC web-site, the Vac Avatar Super has a triode MM phono stage derived from the VAC Signature Preamplifier and Renaissance grade parts throughout.

Maineiac, if you want to set up an A/B experiment let me know. I don't think we're that far apart. I can promise good times and good tunes!

Dan

2.5mv should be plenty for this moving magnet phono stage. I have used cartridges with 1.5mv into phono stages with similar gain without excessive noise or the need to turn the volume way up. Something is wrong with the phono stage, grounding scheme or the cartridge(open loop?). Don't get the step-up device, it's not needed. Even the lowest step-up device at 1:5(most are 1:10 or 1:12) would present the phono stage with 12.5 mv which would overload any normally functioning phonostage. I would start with a phone call to VAC. Let us know what happens.