I need help regarding tube phono preamplifiers

Raul’s point about the C48 is well taken.

Luxman eq-500 will beat the pants off of any of those listed. 

Have had for some time a Tavish Design Adagio. Very flexible in it’s design and what you want at purchase. Can even choose your step up transformer and power supply. Mostly everything mentioned here is off the shelf stuff with a big price tag. Easy for tube rolling also which adds to it’s flexability. Good folks at Tavish. You actually can talk with them. Treated me well. Thus the plug.

I’ve run the VAC Renaissance SE phono stage for 4 years. It’s wonderful. And VERY quiet. But it’s most certainly not "all tube", in that (like the Zesto) it relies on a SUT for MC gain. It has built-in Lundahl LL1931 - which to me sound very fast, crystalline, and slightly lean (I attribute this to the amorphous core material?) compared to most other popular SUTs, which are more full bodied. I would guess the LL1931 was chosen because the VAC’s MM tube stage is very lush, romantic, and full bodied - together the combination is more neutral, but still leaning toward the latter. That said, I found I personally preferred the "full boat" full bodied romantic sound gained by pairing the VAC MM stage with an outboard SUT box other than Lundahl (Quadratic, EAR, Koetsu, CineMag).

I bought a Herron VTPH-2A for a high end Stax/electrostatic headphone system, where it did very well (beat the pants off a Rogue Ares Magnum). It’s a great stage - very neutral and very quiet. It performed well enough there I wondered if it could replace the VAC in my main 2ch. But when I tried this, it didn’t last very long before the VAC went back in. I just enjoyed music more on the VAC.

I originally had a Renaissance non-SE before I exchanged it for an SE. The SE uses much higher end caps & resistors - it sounds a bit more detailed and neutral. But the non-SE is no slouch. You definitely don’t HAVE TO get the SE upgrade; its effect is incremental. Sometimes I wondered if I might even have enjoyed the slightly warmer, relaxed nature of the non-SE more in the long run.

Of course, I just received an Audio Research Reference 3SE phono this weekend. It does what the Herron was doing (and trying to do), but better. It absolutely competes with the VAC. It clearly betters the VAC at conveying spatial information. Instruments and vocals magically emerge and hang in space with more air around them - even when the music gets busy. It’s exceedingly fast and detailed. It lacks a bit of the body and romance of the VAC, but hits a beautiful neutral tone without acting the least bit sterile, thin, or lifeless. NOT analytical, which I can’t stand. It’s every bit as vivid and magical as the VAC, just in a different way. Favored cartridge pairings are aligning with one stage or the other, but a lot is going the Ref 3’s way right now. I’d given up on my rebuilt Coralstone with the VAC (it was TOO warm for that pairing), and it’s now STUNNING on the Ref 3. After 4 years of the VAC, this is a new perspective on my music collection, and at such a high-quality level, that I can’t wait to listen to more.

Still highly recommend the VAC too, if you decide to go that way! A used Renaissance phono stage goes for a LOT less than a 3SE!

I haven’t heard these but personally wouldn’t use tubes in a phono pre-amp as a pre-requisite as the risk of extra noise is considerable. Instead, use tubes in your main pre-amp and roll those as you like. This will keep system noice quiter and provide consistency across phono and DAC in the main system.

I left my tube phone pre--amp (Project DS Tube - just above entry level) for the Gold Note PH-10 with PS. I couldn’t be happier with this pre-amp - versatile mico controller settings for the cartridges and the killer feature of matching equalization to the record manufacturer. I didn’t really consider how much this equalization would matter - it is genuinely a huge difference between RIAA, Columbia, and DECCA.