Chord Huei Phonostage, has anybody tried it?

[Clive197]

As it says in the title, has anybody had experience of the Chord Huei Phonostage yet?

[Hibster_2000]

Tried it? I would love to but fear I would struggle to pronounce the name of it and be laughed at by the shop staff.
If it is as good as their DACs, it will be an interesting product.

[Clive197]

Update. I’ve borrowed the Chord Huei Phonostage from HiFi Lounge and am comparing it with my PS Audio NuWave Phono Converter. Early signs are very good with it seemingly holding its own. Base seems a little more detailed but surface noise seems a little more noticeable. Early days, will take a few days or a week to come to any definitive conclusion.

[struth]

Up here they would have to call it the chord shuggy

[Slawts]

There is a What HiFi review just out which makes it sound a little disappointing although with gorgeous looks.

It would be interesting to see how it compares with your real world view.

[YNWaN]

There’s quite a lot of competition around the £1,000.00 price point. To be honest, the primary feature that makes it a bit different is the option of balanced out. Other than that the technology seems pretty basic.

[Lawrence001]

There’s quite a lot of competition around the £1,000.00 price point. To be honest, the primary feature that makes it a bit different is the option of balanced out. Other than that the technology seems pretty basic.Interesting. I've always thought that unless the source is balanced then anything downstream is only pseudo balanced (unless a balanced converting stage is used liked some TVCs). Does anyone know if you can get true balanced from a pick up cartridge?

[Lawrence001]

As it says in the title, has anybody had experience of the Chord Huei Phonostage yet?The name makes it sound like a piece of Chi Fi not sure Chord have done themselves any favours with the name. I'd just be asking myself why I'm not getting the same quality for £200 [emoji38]

[struth]

kinda expected it to at least have digital out, but doesnt look like it.

[Shovel_Knight]

Interesting. I've always thought that unless the source is balanced then anything downstream is only pseudo balanced (unless a balanced converting stage is used liked some TVCs). Does anyone know if you can get true balanced from a pick up cartridge?

A turntable kinda is a balanced source: you have separate signal+ and signal– from the cartridge and a separate ground connection which connects to the shielding (unless you're running a Rega tonearm)

[Barry]

Interesting. I've always thought that unless the source is balanced then anything downstream is only pseudo balanced (unless a balanced converting stage is used liked some TVCs). Does anyone know if you can get true balanced from a pick up cartridge?

Virtually all pick-up cartridges are balanced in nature. Whilst there are several phonostages that have balanced outputs, the number that offer a balanced input can be counted on the fingers of one hand. Ironically, one of Chord's designs (now no longer made) offered the option for a balanced input.

[Clive197]

Further update. 1st of all my thanks go out to Paul at HiFi Lounge for loaning me the Chord Huei.
I’ve spent the last 2days playing with it and even e-mailed Chord for advise re leaving it permanently powered on. They replied within an hour saying they generally advise switching it off as it warms up very quickly and also conserves electricity (sic). The issue I have with that is that my thick fingers found it difficult to reach behind to turn on/off with the very small power switch.
The sound didn’t best my PS Audio NuWave phono converter and in fact having a detailed top end seemed to highlight surface noise, it was also slightly noisy, a problem the Nu-Wave doesn’t have.
A very disappointing result as it does match my Chord Qutest but too many issues make this a flawed product for me.

[Firebottle]

That's interesting, I thought it was supposed to be very low noise.
Did you adjust the gain setting at all?

[Clive197]

That's interesting, I thought it was supposed to be very low noise.
Did you adjust the gain setting at all?

Absolutely, tried 3 different settings.