I think that @tablejockey is giving some good council. Let's say you decide to pull the trigger and upgrade your table & cartridge. Surely you would want an external phono preamp. Why not add the phono pre now and see if it gets your system closer to where you want to be? If that doesn't get it done, then you have a phono pre to upgrade your table around. There's tons of great phono pre's out there with all kinds of different sound signatures. Good luck and cheers.
How much do I need to spend to make vinyl sound better than digital?
All,
I have a solid vinyl setup that I like to think of as entry-level “plus:” Project Debut Pro with Sumiko Moonstone cartridge. I enjoy vinyl for the ritual but find that my digital gear - a $400 ifi streamer and the AKM DAC built into my Anthem preamp - beats the analog rig in most ways. Far better imaging/soundstage and much tighter bass without the occasional distortion/sibilance/warbling of the vinyl rig. I haven’t messed with cartridge setup other than to check the factory-performed alignment, which looks perfect. The table is perfectly balanced, counterweight set correctly with an electronic scale, etc - so I have no reason to think there’s a setup problem.
Is this par for the course for this level of vinyl gear? What do I need to spend to get my vinyl gear to match the performance of decent digital? I’m thinking of upgrading to a Clearaudio Concept, perhaps with a Hana SL cartridge, but I want to make sure doing that is going to deliver a fundamentally different experience than what I have right now with the Project/Sumiko combination.
No interest in flame wars or rehashing the vinyl/digital debate. I know vinyl can sound wonderful and am simply trying to decide whether I can afford the price of entry for a system that can gets the basics right (no audible distortion/sibilance, decent imaging). I thought the Project/Sumiko would have gotten me there, but for whatever reason it hasn’t fit the bill.Thanks for any insights.