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Valve Phono Stage

The Project DS2 'tube' phono stage is about £600- ish new I think, possibly a little more with the interchangeable magnetic wooden side cheeks.
I paid little more than half of that for a second hand unit, I wouldn't regard it as high end build quality (it's not bad by any stretch) but for the money it's extremely versatile which is handy for multiple arms/cartridges and overall sounds quite decent IMHO @Vinny

I would like a higher end phonostage with better sound quality and build quality but I'm not prepared to give up the versatility that the Pro-ject offers which narrows the choices available.
 
Nobody seems to have mentioned the Jolida JD9 which is a highly regarded hybrid MM / MC phono stage that has numerous dip switches for cartridge matching. 'open door' used to import these and do some worthwhile improvements / modifications. I have one that he upgraded but having removed vinyl from my second system over in France has become redundant and will be up for sale when I can get around to photographing it etc. It thoroughly outperformed a previous EAR 834P and Graham Slee elevator exp head-amp combo I previously had in that system.
 
Ward said:
It thoroughly outperformed a previous EAR 834P and Graham Slee elevator exp head-amp combo I previously had in that system.
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The EAR for MC (SUTs) gets iffy reviews - the MM stage is broadly the same as a Croft and gets good/rave reviews.
The Slee - I found that rather safe/plodding/unexciting.
 
Going back to the OP - valve-based MC stage......................................

Buy and sell SUTs until you find something you like into your valve MM stage.
Improve on that by buying and selling head amp's until you find one that you like into you MM stage.

Been there, done that..........................

The hassle with head amp's is that you will struggle to find many/any withinn the UK (Rothwell - pedestrian in my system....) - I bought a few abroad.
 
Darren L said:
I've never even heard of Jolida @Ward
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American, been going quite a while, made very good valve dacs (Glass fx) valve amps and a valve cdp. Jolida, has since changed its name to Black Ice Audio, I started out with a, pimped mk1 Jolida Glass fx dac and now have a, maxed out Black Ice DSD DAC.

The BI at ~£500 used is a stonking piece of kit which for me with mild pimping stood its own ground/matched a £3k Lab12 Reference, I've since had additional work done by Open Door (original, uk agent) and would be happy to put it up against £5k+ DACs now.
 
Whilst technically Mr Jolida is an American, they are in reality Chinese.

Yes a modified FX glass DAC was to my ears a more enjoyable listen than the original Chord Hugo, but both of them can hang their head in shame next to the DAC /K2 interface in the JVC AX-Z1010TN and that's from 1989!
 
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I had a Jolida JD9. Great value for money and good flexibility. Still, I think it was more an op amp phono stage with a tube output buffer?

I replaced it with a PS Audio Stellar Phono, which was on a whole different level. A real end game product, which I have regrettably just sold due to moving. Looking forward to auditioning something like the TRON after the move.
 
Vinny said:
the EAR unit has got very iffy reviews when used for MC, for instance.
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Vinny said:
The EAR for MC (SUTs) gets iffy reviews -
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With respect Vinny.. have you actually heard one? And where are these 'iffy' reviews?

The only slightly 'iffy' comment I recall was when someone at Hi-Fi World talked it down a bit years ago.. after they'd had a rather public fall out with Tim De Paravicini. Generally speaking the 834p has a solid reputation as a 'classic' bit of kit.

I've been using mine since around 1996, with valve monos and with SS amps and MC cartridges ranging from Ortofon through Audio Technica and Dynavector. One manufacturer service and a couple of new valves later, it's still firmly in my system, amplifying the output from my Michell Orbe/Audiomods S5/Dynavector 17D3, via my LFD Zero MkV into my Rogers Studio 3/AB3 speakers.

No complaints here... In fact it can be quite stunning and very revealing of the source album. A decent s/h unit might well come in under the OP's budget.

I can't comment on the newer 'phonobox' updated version... although interestingly, the user manual and circuit schematic for my original 834p referred to it as a 'phono box' almost 30 years ago.
 
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Mullardman said:
And where are these 'iffy' reviews?
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Here - on PFM - several times.

That said, if you read my comment again, the point is that it is the SUTs in the EAR that get less than glowing reviews, NOT the amp'. Although it is perfectly possible to use an external SUT into the EAR, I suspect that very few people have done so, so that they have no idea how good or bad the internal SUTs actually are.
I have no doubt that the internal SUTs will be a great match to some cart's, but they are exceedingly unlikely to be so for the majority. I say this from personal experience as I have used several different SUTs into my Croft - which uses essentially the same MM stage circuit as the EAR, and they vary considerably when used with a single cart'.
 
Anyway ........ back to the original theme of the thread....

I'm going to check out the Manley Chinook tomorrow - it seems to have almost uniformly great reviews including from folks like Ken Micallef and Ken Kessler. Even though it's s/h I'm aiming to arrange a home demo to see how it works with the system.

Its quite a bit above my original budget ( but what's new there?) and, if I end up getting it, will mean my phono stage (if bought new) would be worth more than my turntable and cartridge combined which seems nuts ( a muffin system rather than a mullet?).
 
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