Paradise Phono Stage

[YNWaN]

I'm nearing completion of my my most recent project - the Paradise moving coil phono stage. This has been a joint collaboration between the folks at DIY Audio (forum) who designed it (and the power supply), Simon (sq225917) who spent hours sourcing parts, selecting components and building up the circuit boards (beautifully too), Andrew (flatpopely) who supplied the cases and me, who put it all together .

In my case (no pun), this phono stage is entirely mono-block built, even down to the power supplies and consists of four Naim 'shoe-box' cases - so it's not for those wanting a minimalist system. Simon built up the boards to be within 1% tolerance (some critical sections are better than 1% I believe). Cartridge loading can be adjusted by inserting capacitor and resistor combinations in to sockets provided on the circuit board (no soldering required). The boards are mounted on acrylic chassis' and sandwiched between neoprene washers. The input sockets are 50ohm BNC and the output sockets are Eichmann copper (which match the cables used).

This design is an all out assault on the state of the art with regard to amplifying the output of a low output moving coil cartridge. I first heard it when Simon built one for himself. As is the norm, he subsequently loaned his stage to me; I was expecting to be rather underwhelmed - but I was not. In fact, after two listening sessions I decided I couldn't live without one and so this project began.

How does it sound? It sounds remarkable is how it sounds! It sounds like you have had a whole amplifier upgrade. It makes my old stage sound quite compressed, vague and soft in the bass. The ability to separate out strands of the music and present them as a coherent rhythmic whole is the best I have ever heard - as a result, timing is outstanding. Detail retrieval is astonishing, but it isn't thrust at you in a 'look at me' sort of way. It could never be described as warm and euphonic, but neither is at all hard or have any transistor 'glare'. Vocal communication is outstanding and the bass is simply Stygian in depth, power and definition - dynamic range is truly amazing!

[Clive]

Sounds like perfection. Simon's looked really great too. Those Naim chassis could have been designed f for it. I'm sure you'll enjoy it tremendously.

[YNWaN]

Yeah, the Naim cases are an ideal size . The only difference between Si's and mine is that his uses a different power supply.

[Rare Bird]

What are those strips by the side of the PCB's?

[YNWaN]

The circuit boards are actually mounted to 5mm acrylic which allowed me to get all the holes in exactly the right places (because I CNC laser cut them). The strips help mount the cable tie mounts that will hold all the cables neat and tidy. The wiring hasn't actually been done in the picture posted. As I have yet to etch the front and back panels I will have to disassemble it when I fit the back panels - so I haven't taken the protective film off the acrylic yet - which is why it is white with yellow writing - the acrylic is black.

[Rare Bird]

Ah right, good idea. Do you work with Acrylic as a living as it could be very handy for some..

[YNWaN]

Do you work with acrylic as a living..

No, not as such.

[Ulysses]

Those look impressive. Not that I know anything about phono stages (other than I have one in-built in my amp), but if size counts then it should sound good.

What phono stages have you compared it with?

[Thing Fish]

Nice floor...

[YNWaN]

The boxes in the right are the power supplies for the boxes on the left . You would need a massive amplifier to fit it all in!

Recently I have compared the Linn Uphorik, the Naim Superline, a couple of Valve stages, a modified Cambridge and a Naim Prefix (also heavily modified) - oh, and my own Naim based stage.