Note - that's a SRM-007II headphone amp, not a I.
Also verified VTF at 1.7g on the nose.
I just listened to Dire Straits - Dire Straits, and it was lovely. No issues.
Moved from there to reissue of Willie Dixon - Willie's Blues, lovely. No issues.
Then, for grins, tried Chicago - Chicago and specifically 25 or 6 to 4.....which should at least test the middle and it does, and it played clear, clean, instrument separation, vocals, cymbal attacks/decays, drum hits, guitar attacks punchy, lively but not overly bright, great channel separation and soundstage.
I don't know, it must be bad recordings or gremlins. I just don't get it.
|
@dducat Perhaps the recording is at fault, there are a ton of recordings wherein the master tape wasn’t that great to begin with..so you are hearing the LP at its best SQ, which may not be that great. i have noticed this with a number of rock LP’s.
OTOH, it could be that your cartridge is worn out in regards to either the stylus or the suspension, or both. Since you bought a used cartridge, I suspect you really have no idea as to how many ’true’ hours are on the cartridge or how it was treated in the first place. Lastly, i would try and change the loading from 200 Ohms up to 750 Ohms, this is where I find my Lyra to sound best ( albeit, highly dependent on phono stage).
|
@daveyf Thanks for the thought on 750 Ohms. I was running my Denon in the 650 Ohm range, and it was really dialed in there. Reading forum posts across this and other posts, it seemed like people were hovering in the 100-200 range, and I did try variations up to 500. I'll give 750 a shot.
And yes, I'm aware of how bad many rock recordings actually sounded and/or were poorly mastered or transferred and I'm sure there is some of that going on here. The Chicago sounds awesome and so, I'm interested to see how it sounds at 750 Ohm load. Thanks again. |
dducat, should not be that way. A resonance problem would effect the bass mostly. Assuming you set it up right something is wrong with the cartridge. Most of the energy is in the mid range and It sounds to me like you might be miss tracking.
I think the only option you have is to send it back to Lyra and have them check it out. |
@mijostyn Thanks for the response. I did, early, have some mis-tracking issues, but with adjusted anti-skating and azimuth adjustment, I think I solved that. The anti-skating adjustment made a significant difference, more than I expected.
I am thinking about sending it in.as well. Given Jonathan Carr is a regular visitor / contributor here, I was hoping he’d weigh in on that very point. |
I would definitely check the rest of that signal path. I’ve run Stax and vinyl and it can be simply sublime, but Stax amps push out a ton of gain (almost as much as an MC phono stage, 54 - 60 dB typical), at very high voltage rails (+/-300V and higher), and the higher performance models (usually from the Stax "DIY" community) can push out a ton of heat too. In short, you gotta keep an eye on them. If your amp has push/pull balance control and DC offset trim pots, learn to check/adjust them. Keep a spare set of fresh tubes on hand - check/suspect the ones you have now.
If you had the 007 (or even 009) headphones I’d say that a Stax 007 amp isn’t going to be powerful enough to drive them to higher volumes without congestion (not unlike what you describe), but the Lambdas are generally much easier to drive than Omega series.
Also maybe think about whether your table setup & phono stage may be sending excess subsonic energy to the Stax amp, possibly overloading it? |
@mulveling Thanks for your thoughts.
I will certainly re-bias the Stax just as a matter of practice. I do have some other tubes to roll (I was going to do that outside of this issue, anyway) but I don't want to change too many variables at once. I will probably do that too however, just because I want to see how they sound, regardless (and they're NOS RCA Black Plates, NOS Raytheon Black Plates and NOS Sylvania US-made).
Right now, I'm only listening through the Stax (e.g. no other amp in play). I do appreciate the concerns about extra gain in the signal path. That had crossed my mind as the Delos puts out more than the Denon does, but I didn't think it was that much to be an issue (..6mV vs..2mV). Given the phono stage has no gain controls, cartridge loading may be the actual issue (assuming that everything else checks out) in the end. |
@dducat 0.2mv vs 0.6v is actually a fairly considerable difference in gain. The phono stage should be working a lot less with your Lyra..and this should actually lead to less noise than your other cartridge...not more.
One other thing to consider, and this is mentioned in the Lyra instructions, is the phono cable capacitance. This can have a factor on the load at the cartridge, and also on the overall SQ, although I wouldn't have thought that it would result in the problems that you are relating.
Do get back to us once you have tried the higher loading. |
@daveyf brings up another good point. 70dB of active JFET gain is a LOT of gain for a cartridge with a healthy 0.6mV of output. You could be cutting it close to the stage's overload margins? Paradox seems like a small shop, and it's possible the focused on super-optimizing the phono stage for their own 0.3mV cartridge (also their website is riddled with grammar errors and misspellings; just a bit concerning when attention to detail is the name of the game in vinyl). Really I'd both checkup the Stax amp and try another phono stage, with something in the range of say 54dB - 62dB of gain, before I suspected the used Lyra cartridge at fault. But then I'm a junkie with multiple of every component on hand :P |
@mulveling Yes, it’s a small shop, but the owner has been incredible in terms of service. Decware, for example here in IL is also a small shop but world-renown for making quality gear. But, your point is valid in that I might be right on the edge of overload. Unfortunately, my other stage and transformer is in use by my 20-year old who I hooked into the habit.
So, I don’t have much I can do there short of buying another stage and I’m not necessarily ready to do that just yet.
@daveyf I am currently running 750ohms and it seems to have made a difference in the middle. It also seems to have narrowed the soundstage a bit. I’m going to run it a bit and see how it goes. It seems that cartridge loading may be the solution and other tweaks (I haven’t rebiased yet) will help beyond that.
Not surprisingly, every little tweak has helped this configuration. I knew it was going to be more challenging going into it, but admittedly, I didn’t think it would be this challenging. But, in fairness, the Denon103R setup is pretty darn easy. |
When you say validated how are you doing that?
I may have missed it but I didn’t see mention of VTF, lyras have a very narrow tolerance but there will be some, does moving the tracking force either side of your target by the minimum you can achieve change the dynamics? I’d expect a very narrow sweet spot.
|
@yeti42 'validated' means that I've done the following:
VTA: Followed the desired standard as set by Lyra (horizontal parallel to record) and then tweaked by ear
Azimuth: Followed the standard as set by Lyra, used MoFi alignment tool to validate and used BT microscope to further validate
Rake Angle: Based on Lyra's documentation and a protractor
VTF: Digital scale @ 1.7g
Anti-skate - set to 0 initially, tweaked by ear (I had it way too high originally)
After having played about 10 albums I think the problem was definitely cartridge loading related. As I mentioned earlier, a little bit of air/soundstage was lost (I think) so I'm going to have to tweak it further. But the change was noticeable when moving up to 750Ohms.
Thank you, everyone for taking the time to respond! |
@dducat The Lyra requires an extremely precise set up ( not only mechanically, but also load wise), due in part to its new angle technology. Getting it close is not going to allow the cartridge to sound its best. Unfortunately, a lot of folk who either own a Lyra, or have heard one, have never heard it set up 100% correctly. This has led to a variety of opinions on the cartridge worth, usually opinions that they are either a) lean and/or b) bright. Your Denon 103R is almost a plug and play type of cartridge compared to your Lyra!
|
Try adjusting the VTF by ear too, use the scales for reference so you can return to an a previous best. Lyra quote a range from 1.7 to 1.8g. Then “revalidate” VTA as this will alter slightly.
On another phonostage (Naim superline) I’ve seen 560Ω mentioned for Lyras but you stage might not mirror this preference. |
@yeti42 Thank you. I will tweak that too. I appreciate the 560Ohm recommendation as I think it's going to float somewhere between that number and 750Ohm in the final/final position. |
hello
you just described a magnetized cartridge
Demagnetize your cartridge and please let us know if it helped
Good luck Willy-T
|
Try Silver wire in the headshell. IME, the delos likes silver wire. |
Try Silver wire in the headshell. IME, the delos likes silver wire. IMO, the Denon 103, if set up properly is just an amazing performer. It can blow away cartridges costing many times the price. I think the Lyra midrange in many ways is not as good as the Denon. The Denon is very natural sounding. I am currently using a Denon 103 on my Technics 1200G. this cartridge has no business sounding this good on this table. Loading at about 500 Ohms and a little heavier headshell than the stock. it is an ortofon LH 4000 I think. After listening to this cartridge on this table, I am starting to question pursuing cartridges costing much more. I am finding out that a well designed table and tonearm are more important than anything in an analog setup. You could put a 200 dollar cartridge on it and it will sound better than a lesser table with a 1000 dollar cartridge. FWIW. we live and learn. lol |
@tzh21y I do have another headshell on the way that I will wire with silver wire as I wanted to try that, too, anyway.
I love my modded Denon103R. It's been great for me, but like most of us, I have upgradeitis too, and wanted to see what I was missing. Well, I know now!
I intended to mount the Delos on a 12" arm and leave it there and use my Denon and others (AT Mono/78) on the current tonearm (swapping out headshells). I haven't mounted the 12" arm yet, so there's that.
I was loading my Denon at about 650Ohms and it was lovely. Hopefully when this is all said and done I'll be able to really compare and contrast the two. |
If you check his posts, I think you might find that JCarr himself has advocated running LOMC cartridges "wide open", at 47K ohms load. (Even though, I know, his poop sheets recommend ">100 ohms", or something vague like that.) You might try 47K. Also, have you checked the innards of your TD124 lately? What you describe sounds to me a lot like what I once heard from a TD124 that wasn't properly serviced.... muddy midrange.
|
@lewm - Yup, that's why I started with the 100Ohm load based on the various forums here, other forums, etc. The kick up to 750Ohms was definitely a positive change.
WRT to the TD124 - I recently installed the MK II motor mounts and re-plinthed it, so I'm fairly confident that part if working correctly. And, as I stated earlier, the Denon 103R worked fine after that as well, and the rest of the signal chain is something that I also need to look at and I will.
Given the significant change in SQ with the load change, I'm fairly confident that loading is the largest opportunity for improvement.
|
@dducat what phono cable are you using and do you know its capacitance spec? Lyra carts really like to see a low cap cable so you can load at the phono stage. I used to run a very high cap phono cable with my Delos loading at 121 ohms. Pretty nice. Then bought a low cap AQ cable and loading at 475 ohms based on the Lyra mathematical settings and the cart opened up and the sound is glorious across the whole musical freq range.
Also if you are at 70dB gain that is huge, you could be overloading your preamp section depending on its input sensitivity. I run my Delos with 56dB gain from my Nova II phono preamp which gets me about 350mV out to the preamp.
All of these things can affect the sound of your Delos. |
@catcher10 - I'm using a cable that I bought from the company that sold me the tonearm (Estoteric sound - premium cable based on the Mogami Neglex 2534) and it's roughly 100pF for 1m. The cable is a hair over 1M long. I was running it at 660Ohms, but going back and looking at the Lyra docs, it appears I should be between 200 and 390 ohms. So, I'm starting at 396 (it's what I had on hand) and I'll work my way down. When I was at 200 before it was where I started hearing mud in the middle, so I'm probably going to stay closer to the high end.
Right now, I'm not running a true preamp - I'm running out to a Stax SRM-007tII to Stax Lambda Nova Signature (404) Headphones which are VERY detailed and very fast. Given what I've known about Stax Tube Energizers/Headphone Amps, they need higher than usual signal gain to be most effective, so I don't think that's it. I haven't actually measured the voltage so I can do that, but as I said earlier, I'm convinced it's just a matter of tweaking the loading and being patient which, of course, I'm not. ;)
Thanks for your input and suggestions. |
I can't recall exactly I think my AQ is around 60pF as a 1.5mt cable. I suspect you have it dialed in as best you can....Enjoy it, the Delos punches miles above its price point. |
unfortunately your turntable and most suspended tables have a warm imprint on the sound.
as others have suggested try different cables, i really like the nordost purple flare between table and phono preamp, will be very neutral and detailed. also experiment with increasing load resistance.
but the other thing you can do is to try different mats. your congested middle might be caused by undamped tonearm to record resonance in the midbass region that definitely affects midrange clarity. the one that always works for me is the herbies way excellent ii, minimum 4mm thick if that fits.
|
@avanti1960 I'm looking at cables in general, but I believe I'm loading correctly now. We'll see what I come up with.
I currently use a Soundeck and I have a leather mat underneath that on top of the stock rubber on the stock Thorens platter. The arm is reasonably new and is damped so...I don't believe that's it.
I'll look into the mat and the cable though. Thanks for the input! |
Delos properly loaded and setup is wicked good. Don’t give up. My setup is Triplaner on a Brinkmann Bardo w silver 1.5 M cable into Herron with minimum loading... Mick Fleetwood is in the room |
"Delos properly loaded and setup is wicked good. Don’t give up. "
I agree. |
Best to run the Delos between 1.73 & 1.75g, which should be set prior to final vta adjustment by ear, I found that mine performs best at 1.73g, it really is a fussy cartridge with regards to setup, once it's setup correctly it's performance is excellent imho. |
