So I've been rocking the Nova Phonomena for more than 10 years now, bought it new all those years ago. It's the one that has a battery powered mode, off the grid with its one green eye. It's served me well and I really have no complaints, but perhaps I might enjoy a more exciting sound as opposed to neutrality. That's where the Darlington MP-7 comes in. Been researching it and no owner seems to have anything bad to say about it, and it may be a giant killer as well. To some it bests a Manley Chinook and a JC3+, and even some in the $4000+ category. I'm one who doesn't believe the more you spend the better the sound, plus I'm bordering on dead broke for this hobby so I have to spend carefully. The Darlington seems like a great fit for my modest system.
I'm running an old Koetsu Black that's been recently re-tipped by VAS, and that's going into a Phasemation T-300 SUT, at 1:20 ratio. I very much like the sound improvements of using the SUT plus the virtual elimination of background noise, so that stays. Thus I only need an MM phono pre, and the TOTL Darlington is now at the top of my list. Another candidate is the Teddy Pardo PHN1.1 that caught my eye last night, though the 2 box solution isn't really appealing to me. But would these actually be an upgrade over the Phonomena? Or is it more of a lateral move? The Phonomena gets really good press, many consider it an affordable reference. But I found that with gain pumped up to 60dB for MC that the hiss and hum was pretty much unacceptable, Thus the addition of the SUT, and gain set to the minimum of 40dB. Sounds pretty darn good at the moment, but can it get better without spending a lot?
Feel like I'm wasting a lot of circuitry just using the Phonomena in MM mode, and perhaps a dedicated MM unit might have less sound degradation. Measurements are pretty meaningless with these things, except for RIAA deviation and input overload characteristics, which the Darlington excels at. It's been described as tubey which is appealing to me, but without the noise and inconvenience. I'm pretty sold on the MP-7 and will probably nab it when my birthday comes around in a couple months. But in the meantime, any thoughts would be appreciated.
