Dynavector XV1s loading & phono

Dear Thom: With all respect to you but IMHO you need to read these links about SUT's:

http://forum.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/fr.pl?eanlg&1130451054&openflup&5&4#5

http://forum.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/fr.pl?eanlg&1138829438&openflup&41&4#41

What you are reading here are facts not a " simple opinion ".
You are not helping to the MUSIC sound reproduction supporting SUT's and the most critical issue is that you are not helping to any of us that are looking for the best quality sound reproduction in our audio systems. You are telling the people that already invest thousands of thousand ( big dollars ) in TT/tonearm and cartridges that put in hand of a terrible/patch SUT the delicate/beloved cartridge signal, incredible from a TT designer!!!!!!??????

Like I told you I respect your opinion but I must totally disagree. Thom you have to " work " with facts and you don't have any single one to support SUT's and you don't have it because does not exist. IMHO you use it because you need it and you need it because you make wrong choices about low output MC cartridges with tube Phonopreamp, but this subject can't mean it that a SUT is better that a well designed high gain Phonolinepreamp: absolutely not!!!!!!!

Regards and enjoy the music.
Raul.

Regards and enjoy the music.
Raul.

Raul, in your links, I don't see much that I would ackowledge as being "facts."

To address your comments one by one, yes, distortions will be generated at the core of an SUT, but distortions are also being generated in any MM or MC cartridge (both in the signal core and in other places). In your recent posts you have noted a preference for cartridges that measure to be poorer than normal in terms of distortion. If you clearly can like cartridges that measure to have higher-than-normal levels of distortion, why are you afraid of distortion in the SUT?

Bandwidth of an SUT may not go down to DC, but I have a test transformer on my bench that measures dead-flat down to 10Hz, with a -3dB roll-off of 1Hz. The top end is dead-flat to at least 30kHz (the top-end response after that depends on the load). Far better than any loudspeaker, for sure.

True, an SUT has a reactive electrical component, but so does any cartridge that has an inductive output (all of them) when you use it with an interconnect cable that has capacitance (again all of them). The audibility of the resulting electrical resonance is directly related to the inductance of the cartridge (high inductance plus cable capacitance means a resonance that may be close to the audible band and can be measured and heard directly, while low inductance means a resonance that remains at RF frequencies, and shouldn't be directly audible unless your phono stage has linearity problems at RF frequencies and IMD subsequently allows the electrical resonance to fold down into the audible band). At least with a stepup transformer, you can physically place it close to the phono stage and keep the interconnect cables ultra-short (thereby reducing capacitances). With a high-inductance cartridge like an MM, you need to keep the cable long (therefore meaning high capacitance), and this will give you an electrical resonance that is far more likely to be directly audible and also measureable in the audible band. This is why, although high-inductance cartridges like MMs make life easy for many phono stages due to the high signal voltage, many audiophiles still prefer low-inductance MCs, even if they need to use stepup transformers into low-gain phono stages. FWIW, every MM that I've listened to and thought sounded acceptable had low inductance.

Mind you, normally and by preference, I also prefer to design with and use fully active amplification when it comes to phono equalizers. However, I know from first-hand experience that it is possible to design a stepup transformer that at least measures pretty well and sounds reasonable. And let us not forget that there are many phono equalizers that audiophiles like and already own that would benefit substantially from some extra gain with small noise penalty (and also in some cases, benefit from judicious band-pass filtering). Both of these are attributes that a stepup transformer can easily provide. Let's not insist that audiophiles throw out their existing phono amplifiers just to satisfy a technical argument which doesn't appear to be on such solid foundations.

regards, jonathan carr

Raul you are certainly entitled to your opinions but it is disingenuous telling anybody else they are wrong. Their opinions are equally valid.

You may have more toys than most of us but it does not mean you are smarter than some of us.

Raul please lay off your dogmatic opposition to step up transformers. We all know you have a vested (commercial) interest in your Essential design (which uses solid state for MC gain).

I have heard Thom's system for something like 40 hours, and if the theoretical disadvantages of SUTs that you state are audible, they were not apparent in Thom's system.

My view is that whatever phase anomalies are introduced by a SUT, they are orders of magnitude less than the phase havoc wreaked by the average speaker crossover.

I agree with Thom, that it's futile to generalize about topologies - it's all in the execution. There are good and bad MM and MC cartridges, tube and solid state amps, horn and open baffle speakers, ad infinitum.

Dear Raul,

I take issue with your incessant proselytizing about the evils of step-up transformers.

The fact that you embrace a particular architecture means only that after years of dedication, you have arrived at a solution which works well for you and certainly for many others. This is something to be proud of.

Your fine product however, in NO WAY invalidates alternative system architectures.

There are many of us here - the great unwashed - who in our holistic view of musical reproduction can best connect with music by using vacuum tubes as a conduit to Nirvana.

If the "compromise" in using a vacuum tube based RIAA involves using a step-up transformer, we are fine with that, because in the end, we are making a connection, and this is what it's all about.

Surely, there are some very fine hybrids circuits which minimize our exposure to silicon and dispense with step-ups.

In the end, it's not the architecture, but the end result - connecting with music.

I realize that you are trying to be helpful to the original poster, and I respect your sincerity, but please, please, please ... don't speak in absolutes. Reality cannot be mapped in a linear manner.

Thom @ Galibier