Aesthetix Rhea signature phono stage

the rhea is sensitive to the tubes used. it has gotten a bad rap because of this. also, if a tube is pulled before 20 minutes of being powered down, damage to the circuit can occur, which will cause noise. the caps need to discharge fully.
it's a very good and versatile phono stage. I used one for years.

Corby, When you use the term "powered down", do you mean switched off, using the rocker switch on the rear panel, or to "Standby" mode? If the latter, I can understand why that would damage the circuit; there are still high voltages in the chassis. It might even be unsafe to pull tubes in that condition. However, it's true that there are a plethora of ICs used to run all the automated features, and these can be damaged by careless operation. I know this, because I killed an IC myself while installing new coupling capacitors in my Janus Signature. (Well, I converted it to "Signature" with new caps.) This was due to my goof; one of the new caps was shorted to the chassis.

As for "noise", I am not sure what to think yet of the Janus. However, it can sound great. I only wish it had a "Mono" switch, for mono LPs.

I have a Rhea sig . Sounds great. Noisy? no. I use stock tubes and 56 db of gain