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Colibri or Hummingbird?

Hi all,

I'm experiencing a rather annoying 'hum' with my Colibri XPW cartridge. It sits in a Reed 3P tonearm on a Micro RX-1500 and goes into a Boulder 1008 Phono amp (the Reed tonearm cable has RCA plugs, so I'm obliged to use the Boulder's RCA-XLR adapters). The hum is typical to the Colibri/Reed combo. The two other tonearms I use on the RX-1500 (one of which also goes straight into the Boulder) are completely silent, no matter what cartridges are used.

The hum resides in the background while the arm is in stationery position, but it turns into a fierce 'humming' the moment I touch it, again retreating to the background when I release the arm. Strange enough this problem comes and goes and had almost completely disappeared for a while. But for some reason it has returned again, without having made any changes in the system.

It's a complete mystery to me, so I hope some of you might be able offer some explanation. And if possible a way to get rid of it.....


edgewear

Showing 4 responses by rauliruegas

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rauliruegas
12,842 posts
 
Dear @jtimothya : The best adapter is NO adapter, always makes a high signal degradations.

R.
Ag insider logo xs@2x
rauliruegas
12,842 posts
 
Dear @edgewear: That kind of job is extremely easy to do, maybe the more expensive and not really expensive could be the pair of Neutrik XLR connectors. That distributor is a "thieve " because for that price we can buy a new IC phono cable with XLR.

Try to find out a technician to fix that problem.

R.
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rauliruegas
12,842 posts
 
Dear @edgewear: The best is what you said: to have reterminated the cable with XLR connectors. Those adapters are really degrading the quality performance level of that lovely Colibri or any other cartridge.

R.
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rauliruegas
12,842 posts
 
Dear @edgewear: Like Spencer sid seems to me  groun problem tht could be nywhere from the Reed tonerm female cartridge connectors to the IC cbles connectors. Somewhere in between exist a " cold/loose  solder tht sometimes is ok nd sometimes develops the problem. So you need to check ll the wiring/IC cbles connector termintions trying to look for tht ground problem. The orienttion/position of the IC cbles could help  little but the problem will not disppears totally. You need to check those contct connectors including the tonerm ground one.

R.
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