Ground loop b/w amp and phono stage


I recently bought the Ayon Triton integrated and when it is connected to my phono stage, Pass Labs XP-15, there is a major buzz coming through the speakers which increases as you turn up the volume. You can even hear it through the music when played at high volume. Needless to say, I'm not playing vinyl at the moment. But when I used the CD player, there is no buzz at all. It's only there on the input which the phono is connected to.

I have used cheater plugs, cheap cables with the ground removed, I've connected the amp directly into the wall plug, I switched from unbalanced to balanced interconnects, and am currently out of ideas. The Pass worked perfectly with my previous solid state mcintosh gear.
ssayeed

Showing 4 responses by atmasphere

The most common problem when this shows up is a but in the arm wiring, FWIW.
This is a temporary fix, but try getting an AC ground cheater from the hardware store and put it on the AC cord for the phono section. It may be that the phono section has its ground connected right to the wall, which means you have a ground loop. See if that sorts it out.

I ran into this problem with an electronic crossover at the recent RMAF.

The preamp should be the only thing in the system that has a hard connection to the AC ground, and even there it can be dicey, as so many components in high end audio don't have their grounding systems properly thought out.
Ssayeed, based on what I have read here it sounds like there is a bad ground at the input of the preamp.

No cables => no buzz
2 different arms => buzz
ground cheater =>

If the above is all true the only other possibility is that *both* tone arms have a problem.
Ssayeed, did you cheat the AC ground on the Ayon Triton integrated? Sounds like the problem is there rather than with your phono sections!