An impression of some phono stages

Today I went to an audio shop in Amsterdam, A10Audio/room4music. The shop together with the Dutch forum Hear.nl and audio importer Music2 organised an phono stage comparison day. I will not call it a review since the a proper review takes more time.

This meeting has 3 purposes.
1) To meet some fellow audiophiles
2) To compare some phono stages
3) To bring A10Audio/room4music under the attention.

First I want to mention the Alex, the man who runs A10Audio/room4music did a terrific job. He and Music2 spent 2 days setting everything up and using a 1000Hz tone to mark where the volume knob on the preamp needs to be so all phono stages would play at the some volume.

Two audio stes would be used The first set is:

Speakers Magico M5
Turntable Acoustic Signature Thunder
Tone arm SME 5
Cartridge van den Hul Canary
Pre amp Octave Jubilee
Mono power amps Octave MRE220
Cables Sonore/Kemp/Nordost

First phono stage we listened to was the Nagra VPS. I had high hopes for this one. It always gets could reviews in the press. So when the needle hit the record I was unimpressed to say the lest. I know the Magico M5 can sound very detailed almost analytical. But this sounded just muddy, unfocused.It had nice bass but there was no 3D sound image. No separation between the instruments. I thought maybe I was sitting in the wrong spot but when I looked around in the room I could tell no one liked what they were hearing.

Next on the list was an Octave phono module. This phono stage is of a modular design it is a phono stage that can also function as pre amp. We did not use the pre amp. We uses a MC module which used a step up transformer. This sounded a lot better. There was a nice 3D sound stage. Good instrument separation. It sounded much more alive then the Nagra. I still detected a bit of a tube sound. But very subtle. Some people like this I was not so sure. But the phono stage was very good.

Third and last on this set was set was the van den Hul Grail. This time the difference was not so big. The sound was similar as the Octave. But there were also some small differences. To my ears the van den Hul had even better instrument separation and better mid and high. The lower octaves were a bit less impressive. Also it was a bit more clinical compared to the Octave. But in my ears the van den Hul Grail sounded a bit better then then Octave phono module. But I could be happy with either.

As far as I could gauge the group no one preferred the Nagra most preferred the Octave one and some the van den Hull.

All these phono stages cost around 5500-6000€

Nest we would listen to a other set. While this might not be ideal but the shop owner did not just want to show 1 set so we moved to a different room. Where the following set up was waiting.

Speakers Marten Django XL
Turn table Acoustic Signature Storm (Thunder)
Tone arm SME V
Cartridge van den Hull ?? (more on that later)
Pre amp EMM labs Pre2
Stereo power amp Octave RE290

First on the list was a EAR 834P. However it turned our there was a technical problem. The right channel did nothing. Some things were tried. But in the end the most likely scenario seemed to be that the cartridge was broken. One of the coils seemed to be fried. Due to time restraints the EAR was not reviewed any further. From the aprox 3-4 minutes that I did hear it the sound was not that great.

The turntable was changed to the one we used earlier. But this meant we could not listen to the Blue amp model 42 since the blue amp only has balanced inputs and this turntable ahd a fixed interlink with RCA connectors.

Then we moved on to a Dutch brand Array. The phono stage is the PH2. The first series (PH1) were sold using the van den Hull name in the US. Some people love this phono stage. I can understand why. It does nothing wrong. But neither does it do anything right. It is just some much of a "high end" audio sound, to dead clinical. There is no live no enjoyment to it. Some high end audio can sound like this. It lets you hear all the details but no music. It costs about 2400€.

Next was the RCM prelude. While the lowest octaves and the transparency were noticeably less then the Array at least the music was back. I liked this phono stage. It was nice and dynamic with a good open sound. It really did not do anything wrong. This one costs about 2000€

Now at my request the Symphonic Line phono stage was hooked up. This is a second hand and the asking price is about 1900€. Compared to the RCM it sounded a lot more natural. But was lacking bass. Still it sounded very good. Very free flowing open sound sound without sounding analytical. But the new price is about 4000€ and it was certainly not twice better then the RCM and depending on taste the RCM might even be better.

Last but certainly not least was the van den Hull Grail SB (special balanced). This phono stage costs about 13000€. But is sounds so good. We used the RCA inputs since we could not change phono interlinks. According to the importer it sounds much better when using the balanced inputs. But everyone agreed that even using the RCA it sounded absolutely great. Now I have not heard many phono stages in this price range. But is beats everything I have heard. My previous reference was the Pass XP-25 as far as I could tell the van den Hul Grail SB beats it. The sound is just so good in every way I could find nothing to fault.

After the listening we talked a little. One of the most interesting things I noticed. That (almost) everyone preferred the second set. Even though it was a lost cheaper. People thought it sounded better balanced. And I agree. Personally I think the Magico M5 were to blame for that. IMHO they are a love 'm or hate 'm speaker. Most of the people in the group certainly did not fall in the love 'm group.

Just prove that more money does not always make for a better sounding set.

I have taken the Symphonlic line with me. First impressions are not that great. The mids and high are great. But it seems I have lost all low frequencies. All the oomph is gone. I have to check to see if I did not make a wiring mistake. But so far the lack of low is a deal breaker.