New to high end audio phono parasound p5

I actually picked up a pro-ject carbon, but not yet hooked up. The Parasound P5 was on order and not yet arrived.

I'd like to know if anyone has a P5 if they are using the built in phono preamp or an external.

No help here. I use a Parasound JC-2 preamp with a JC-3 phono stage, and the pair are capable of superb sound. I don't know how well that generalizes to the P5, but Parasound seems to aim for transparency, i.e., letting the source shine through.

db

There are some professional reviews of this preamp available online. The most usable I found (for phono) is the Stereophile review by Art Dudley. Dudley is very much a moving coil and tube guy. His reference is a Shindo Masseto all-tube preamp that retails for $13,500. In spite of this frame of reference, once the Parasound broke in, he was very complimentary of its overall sound, speed, and clarity. Having recently moved to an all-tube hand-wired phono stage myself, Dudley's assessment is high praise for a $1K SS unit with built-in phono, DAC, and bass management.

As for the phono stage, he liked the MM section a lot, but found the MC side to be adequate but not great. However, when he used an MC cartridge with his step-up transformer into the MM input, he liked the sound *a lot*. Dudley's step-up transformer probably costs several times the price of the Halo P5. But what that means is that the MM input is very good and noise-free. So if you're using an Ortofon 2M Blue or Red (or whatever's installed on the Carbon these days), the P5 should be an excellent match.

Many moons ago before the cd came out most preamps came with an on board phono stage. That being said you should be satisfied with the one that comes with that preamp. Anything else would be overkill. I had many preamps that had a better phono stage than some outboard ones I've tried.

Thanks for all of the replies. The reason I asked, being with live sound some of the console preamp isn't as good as out external preamp. The signal had to be patched out to external unit for the vocal at least.

I still haven't had a chance to test the P5 yet. My speakers is not yet complete. It's too much work more me to hook it into my home theater system as all the components are in the basement.

Will listen to it before I make any decision. Thanks again for the inputs.