Are expensive phono preamps worth it?

[Clive]

My MM level cartridge (not strictly an MM) which requires an MM phono stage has a current list price of £3k. It sees off a lot of MCs. Whether this cartridge qualifies as a contender in this discussion I suppose is open to question.

[jmalkovich18]

I had pre cambridge 540; 650, shiit mani, project phono box s. Most i like project. Now thinkin about more expensive project tube box. DS2, its around £600. Thinkin connect to naim5i with 685 S2

[struth]

I had pre cambridge 540; 650, shiit mani, project phono box s. Most i like project. Now thinkin about more expensive project tube box. DS2, its around £600. Thinkin connect to naim5i with 685 S2

Looked at that and the ds2 usb one too. Both look decent but without a trial it's really difficult. I've heard some fairly ordinary stages for a lot of money before. A whest comes to mind

[montesquieu]

I believe the answer is yes. The phono stage has a tricky job in that the signals it has to deal with are very small. So attention to earthing, noise and layout are far more important than in other amplifiers. If you use a moving coil then it becomes even more important as there microVolts to work with not milliVolts. If you use a low output moving coil then you are really a glutten for punishment.

Od course what you spend will depend upon the rest of your system and what your expectations are. As always there are some expensive lemons and some brilliant, expensive phono amps and matching them to your system becomes more important.

+1 to all of this.

[alphaGT]

I tend to go with a rule of thumb to keep the money spread evenly. A £2k ‘table, with a £2k arm, and a £2k cartridge, and a £2k phono pre. For example. But of course this is not a hard and fast rule, just pointing out that it may prove unwise to buy a £4K cartridge and connect it to a £200 phono pre. Or visa versa.

But, as everyone else above has said, quality varies at all price points. Plus, it’s just a fact of life that one cartridge may work better with a particular phono stage than another of the same price. And, how well a phono pre works with a particular main preamp can also be true. So, it opens the need to listen to all combinations, and hear how each works in your system. A major headache when shopping. And don’t forget a decent phono cable! This cable will make a larger difference in SQ than any other cable in your system, seeing it handles such low level signals. But you don’t have to spend a few grand to get a decent cable. Just the one that works best with your gear. I bought a used VPI cable for $200, I have no complaints.

My Parasound main preamp has a nice built in phono pre. I was using a Grado Gold cart., at the time and when I moved to an external Musical Surroundings two box phono pre, there was a major jump in SQ! A $1000 unit new, I got used for $400. And is battery powered.

So, I moved up to a Sumiko Blue Point EVO 3. A little more than twice the price of the Gold. I tried both with the built in phono, and while the Blue Point was better, it wasn’t a vast improvement. But! When I played them both through the Musical Surroundings unit, the difference in cartridges was major! It made the new Blue Point shine! And, according to my own math, I should upgrade to a $1000 cart., to get the most out of my phono preamp. But, I’m loving the Blue Point right now, it does many things right, and I’m in no hurry to upgrade, but probably will eventually. Would it sound even better if I bought a BAT $7,000 phono preamp? I’m sure, but I would not be getting the most from it feeding it from a $500 cart. So, even money makes sense. To me anyway.

Russell

[oldius]

I use integrated amps with internal phono stages. I did use high end pre-power with a high end (3.6k) phono stage. A friend of mine has recently changed his 6k valve integrated with 3k phono stage for the integrated amp I have too, so it's not just me!

Back in the day, your phono stage was your amp. Vinyl was the medium of choice so if your amp's phono stage was poor, the amp didn't sell.

There is no link, especially in the used market, between cost and quality IMO. As always, trust your ears and demo what you want to hear.

[Yomanze]

As you go up the chain, things get more explosive, dynamic, quiet and open. Phono stages are just as important, if not more so, than the cartridge IMHO. Price doesn’t always mean performance though...

[cjm123]

..Sorry late to this thread as per usual!Doh!

I have owned a lot of low to mid (£100-350) priced phono stages over many years and they all have their pros and cons. Some are insensitive with insufficient gain, some sound clinical and some suffer from earthing and hum susceptibility problems. Price seems to be no reliable indicator of a phono stages sound quality.

IMHO you could do a lot worse than a Croft Acoustics Micro 25 and kill two birds with one stone. I bought one and it has a quite simply brilliant MM phono stage and a great pre-amp which brings life and emotion to all that pass through it. It is fast, quiet with plenty of gain and is fun to listen to and beautifully built by a true craftsman who always supports his gear...and a bargain price and there is not much out there that you can all that about these days.

Oh, and one final thing, it has cured me of any desire to keep swapping phono stages or pre-amps.

[Lawrence001]

+1 on the croft I loved my micro basic but for those for whom money is tight, I now use one of those Yaqin valve stages and I'm more than happy with it.

Sent from my BLN-L21 using Tapatalk

[Fiddlefye]

Last week a friend gave me to try a beautifully-built Bottlehead Seduction with all of the upgrades and prime quality bits employed. It had been sitting on his shelf for a number of years and had a new NOS tube set in it. After maybe 30 hours of play time it really is sounding delightful. I'm running a custom-built SUT (Microtrans transformers) into it and am delighted. I've tun quite a number of phono stages/pres over the years and this one is definitely the new favourite. Not at all expensive, either.