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Killer budget phono stage

Fergus

pfm Member
If anyone is in the market for a budget priced phono stage that performs well above and beyond I would suggest taking a look at the Spartan 5 by Michael Fidler.

https://michaelfidler.com/spartan/5/

I had had designs on his Spartan 10 but faffed around to much and it was discontinued, however by this turn of fate I got the S5 and it is really good. So good in fact that I have been working through trying it out with my British vintage integrated amplifiers and it has brought a new lease of life to each of them. I’m particularly enjoying it just now with my Creek CAS4040, and its the only one that hasn’t been serviced!



It has made me hungry to try his new Spartan 15 for my main system, it is the new cheaper replacement for the S10 and was a further development from the design of the S5 if I’ve understood things correctly!

And the best thing of all is they all have a mono switch, hooray.
 
Good MM stages don't seem to be very hard to make. I'm not sure I've heard a bad one. I've got a little thing here about the size of a cigarette packet which I bought off eBay for about the same price as one. Runs off a 9v battery and it sounds...fine.
 
The only really bad MM stage I have ever heard was the MM section of a £6000 phono amplifier. The MC section was sublime, but the MM section was truly terrible!
 
The Tisbury passive was certainly good at the price and was my gateway to passive preamps.

Dinky, well made, cheap, nicely performing stuff like Tisbury, Temple and Amptastic is very satisfying.
 
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Tisbury seems to have great reviews (and looks) plus several gain settings but no mono, spartan 5 has a mono switch which seems useful and little else. The sonneteer has little info. They seemed to have dabbled with a few wireless and personal devices lately but not sure how much the company has in common with the original Sonneteer?
 
Just hooked my Hagerman Bugle 2 into my system -every time I do this I am so impressed with this roughly 200 USD (less if you can find a used unit) phono preamp. I have lots of better/more expensive phono preamps -but for MM/IM carts the Bugle 2 is really impressive and a pleasure to listen to music thru. Pretty shocking. Warning: Has a clear plastic case -if this is going to freak you out-look at the Bugle 3 which offers gain switching and a meta case (essessentially the same circuit).
 
Tisbury seems to have great reviews (and looks) plus several gain settings but no mono, spartan 5 has a mono switch which seems useful and little else. The sonneteer has little info. They seemed to have dabbled with a few wireless and personal devices lately but not sure how much the company has in common with the original Sonneteer?

They are the original Sonneteer.

The Bard's phono seems very interesting ... at least one of the few phono stage set with very low capacitance (47pF).

Has anyone heard it?
 
Hi Matteo and will respond to your email shortly. The Bard Phono is aimed mainly at MM stages though the higher gain setting will allow some MCs to work. Though as you say the input C is 47pF which is actually widely recommended for MMs. Input R is 47K which is more suited to higher gain output devices. Though if noise can be kept down it might be OK for some MCs which are not super low output. MM is the way for this product though in reality.
Haider
 
Tisbury seems to have great reviews (and looks) plus several gain settings but no mono, spartan 5 has a mono switch which seems useful and little else. The sonneteer has little info. They seemed to have dabbled with a few wireless and personal devices lately but not sure how much the company has in common with the original Sonneteer?
I'd hate to age any of us but we dabbled with wireless stuff in 2003. Just a couple of years after releasing the Original Sedley phonostage and about the same time as releasing the Bornte 'digital' amp. We had fun trying new things. Some fly some don't. The dabble with a low priced phonostage is an interesting exercise. Soundwise, we think, it's good, I use it daily, but it's a tough area of the market. Expectations are different. The Sedley was an easier sell if we are honest.
 
I liked the Spartan 5 so much I bought the Spartan 15 and, good though the S5 is the S15 is significantly better. And it has a mono switch.
 
I’m looking at a new (budget phono stage) and tempted by the tisbury but I’m wondering if anyone has used one with an at95ml or related? The Tisbury capacitance is listed at 220pF but this seems far too high for audio-technica carts or is it fine in practise

(my other current stylus is an ortofon om20 which I assume is more flexible in terms of capacitance)
 


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