Quote Originally Posted by petrat View Post
Exactly. I once had 3 phonostages, 4 SUTs, 6 cartridges, and a couple of preamps in the house .... and the 'ranking order' of each varied depending on partnering equipment. Phonostages (and SUTs) are the most difficult things to get right ime. All that, coupled with the clear pre-dispositions of key participants, makes any worthwhile conclusions from forum reports impossible imo.
Plus the fact you need to try any piece of kit in your own system to get a handle on what it really sounds like. Listening to equipment hooked up to an unfamiliar system in unfamiliar surroundings only gets you so far in evaluating an audio component.