Fidelity Research FR-64 vs. FR-54

Lewm

I do use the dynamic balance with my FR64S, largely because the Acutex cartridge is so light in weight that I cannot otherwise achieve VTF. I looked around for a heavier FR counter-wt, which would make it possible to balance the tonearm mechanically, but did not find one.

This don't make sense, if the Acutex is too light you would need a lighter counterweight. Most people have the 250g counterweight with the FR64S.
I have the W170 ( 170g ) lighter counterweight which is useful for lighter cartridges; you should try and get hold of one if you are going to use a variety of cartridges on your FR64S.

Lewm,
The original W170 is hard to find. Best place is Japanese market.
This company makes copies....  
http://www.vcyoyo-mitsuke.jp/shopbrand/034/O/

Raul, your system has some interesting components. There are two glaring issues in my view -

1. It is simply not possible to accommodate a true full range system in your small, over damped room without the room itself inducing significant distortion. The location of your equipment between your speakers and the proximity of the speakers and subwoofers so close to the walls is a severe restriction on performance. If you believe that you have achieved flat response in this environment, then it must be at the expense of significant phase and time errors at the listening position resulting in severely distorted soundstage reproduction and distorted fundamentals and overtones.
Furthermore the multi driver approach to speaker building has its own distortions related to competing wavefronts emanating from the drivers in room that cause smearing and phase and time anomalies. Not even steep crossover designs and digital correction systems can fully address this issue.

2.You have stated recently that your analogue source cannot match your digital source. This indicates to me that your analogue system is seriously deficient, particularly in resolution. I have heard Meitner, Soulution, MSB, PS Audio Direct Stream, Zanden digital front ends in situ and they are still not up to the best analogue in resolution. I would suggest you look at purchasing a fully integrated analogue front end such as a complete Rega package ( P10 including Rega arm and cartridge ) that is plug and play. This would give you a benchmark analogue front end that will enable you to see where you have gone wrong. It is possible because you have so many turntables, arms and cartridges that you cannot see the wood for the trees and indeed are missing out on the analogue experience.

In summary it is great that you enjoy your system, but your system is a summation of distortions induced at every level in the chain including the room. That you would hold out that your system has lower distortions than any other on this forum would be a fantasy at best..
Regards

Lewm/The Kong,
I agree that some of the claims of flat response in room on this forum are doubtful where the listening room is small. I have even seen one claim on this site that a system using pair of Acoustats in a room not much bigger than a broom closet can reproduce bass flat down to 20hz in room. Furthermore full range systems often "overdrive" small rooms. ( For Rauls benefit, this is not conjecture, I have learned this from experience in setting up 100's of systems ). In my own case my listening room is 37'x15' with a high stud ceiling and the benefits when shifting the system from a smaller medium sized room were obvious.
Similar experiences shifting turntables around the room relative to the speaker position have resulted in reduced distortion in my experience - this is not rocket science - it is simply finding the least resonant environment for positioning a mechanical device that measures minute groove modulations in motion. In my experience locating the TT between the speakers is second only to "behind the speaker" or corner location  in inducing distortion into the playback.

Raul -
2 further thoughts on your system. You will be pleased to know that like you I use outdated bipolar devices for optimum LOMC amplification, mine designed and hand built by Reto Andreoli. It is vastly more transparent and than anything else I have heard including my old Klyne 3.5 and some pretty exotic SUT's.
As far as the Levinson mono blocks, the mods you describe make good sense, but at the end of the day those amps are slow. I would only use them for boat anchors. You might want to look at replacing those in my view,

Cheers. 

Raul,
It is possible your preamp is quite good. ’State of the art’ unlikely from what I’ve seen. For a start the casework and circuit board physical attributes utilised in the Essential in of themselves induce significant hysteresis distortion. Your circuit boards are nothing special. What is "state of the art". "state of the art" implies state of the current art, but what you don’t understand is that there are many design engineers out there in non audio industries that are operating at design levels way ahead of current audio "state of the art".

I have access to 2 engineers who work outside the audio spectrum - one can reproduce any solid state phono stage currently in existence with improvements - you want a vendetta why ? I can build you a Blowtorch with enhancements. Halcro in this forum had a fault in his Halcro preamp, my tech can read the circuit and chips used from the topology even without removing the masking paint from the board and components. You want the noise floor of the latest Burmester preamp lowered - no problem. You want to improve Lewms tube preamp - no problem - we can go in there and do onboard regulation using new state of the art stacked op amps that no tube manufacturer would even be aware of unless they were designing in the digital domain as well. Why doesn’t he produce audio equipment - because commercial audio product cannot bear the cost of a design engineer who is operating at a level above current state of the art in our hobby.

You want a phono stage unlike any other produced - easy - the other engineer built his own phono stage designed specifically for MC’s with output down to 0.1mv and below including compensation for known cutterhead/amplifier deviations from RIAA using proprietary Burr brown chips. Can it be produced commercially - no because the chips are 1 off advanced research chips not even available to any current audio designer including the likes of Bob Stuart at Meridian - we are talking 3 generations ahead of current technology when it was produced.

So my friend take it from me - anything available commercially is out of date even before it is released to market, and significantly off true "state of the art" for which my definition is "in advance of what is currently commercially available by a significant margin".
Your Essential preamp is irrelevant to this forum - it is not available for audition anywhere commercially and if you think it is more advanced than anything else, then you are deluding yourself, there is always something out there better.

Cheers

Raul
My MC pre eschews the use of circuit boards, has no wiring, every component is soldered to the other components in free space ( in a 3 dimensional array to minimise component interaction as is done in the Mares Connoisseur ).
For your next build you might want to look at eliminating the circuit boards, and eliminate the resonant and hystereses inducing metal chassis, and all switches in the signal path. If your circuit is as good as you claim, then eliminating the circuit boards, resonant chassis and switches should be an audible improvement of a significant margin.

The answer to your question is yes, the same Reto Andreoli that builds cartridges selling up to $50k and for which he has an 18 month waiting list. Personally I don't use his cartridge but he has some interesting ideas on cartridge tracking/cantilever/stylus profile and the issues of how to minimise distortion on playback. He is a fan of the cantileverless Ikeda MC that I use which is very close to emulating the cutter head action in playback resulting in very low mechanical distortion and phase anomalies on playback.  

Nandric,
I'm not convinced "we all think in the same way". My professional life includes overhauling businesses and business processes. Believe me, one of the most powerful ways of removing "blockages" in businesses is by showing people how to think differently and empowering them.

Notwithstanding, I have no dispute with Raul other than I object to his claim that he has superior listening capability "AHEE" to everyone else on this forum. Raul cannot possibly know this for certain unless he has personally met everyone and experienced many listening sessions with every single person on this forum. Clearly that is not the case.

Similarly, Rauls claims that  his audio system has lower distortion than every other system on this forum cannot be proven. Now here I am able to critique this premise on the basis of shared experiences. I own or have listened to extensively many of the cartridges, arms and turntables that Raul has reviewed on this forum and from those reviews I have been able to discern quite clearly that his system is low resolution as far as analogue goes. Even if we assume he has the best phono stage in the world, there are failings to extract the best from his cartridges. In my view the issue probably lies in his choice of turntables and arms. In some instances it may be that his cartridges have been purchased second hand or are 30 years old and are not performing to the standard that they left the factory. Poor set up on his part is another possibility - I have already posted links to photos that show Raul set his Dynavector Nova 13 ( which by the way had been butchered with a replacement cantilever nothing like the original ) had been mounted with the headshell upside down. 
Link to Rauls butchered Dynavector Nova 13D compared to my own factory rebuilt specimen - look that the cantilevers in the photo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-vveRGz-s4g
Link to Rauls Dyanvector Nova 13D mounted the wrong way up in its custom headhsell -  
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x4o-imxZHS8     
For someone who claims to be a more knowledgeable than everyone else on this forum this lack of understanding on how to set a cartridge up properly as evidenced in the photos above is enlightening.

Cheers. 
 

I explain ( trhough an Agon post. ) in precise way that that picture that shows the cartridge mounted in its dedicated headshell was only to use it in my ad for sale Agon listing.

Raul, why would you mount, advertise and sell a cartridge mounted incorrectly in its dedicated headshell upside down. Do you sell your Essential preamp with the channels reversed inside the preamp for fun too ?  

I never mounted the 13D in my system with that headshell: never.

Therefore you posted a review of this cartridge without having listened to it in the Dynavector recommended proprietary headshell, hardly an authoritative review. Furthermore check slide 3, it is mounted incorrectly in your tonearm. Tell me, how do you review cartridges - do you just look a them. And of course you pass a review on a cartridge you have never heard - your Dynavector 13D had a non standard cantilever bearing no resemblance whatsoever to the original.
Raul, if you read my posts more carefully you may find the path to exceed your AHEE status and move up to my level. I am well past the cognitive development stage and am now at the AHAA level.

Cheers