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Phono cartridge noises

Hi All, 

I finally after many years built a new home with a dedicated music room and was quite happy with it until I connected my turntables. I've never run across this and looking for advice as I'm truly lost on what I’m experiencing. 

I have two phono preamps, the Jolida JD-9 II / Grado Gold G2+2 High Output cartridge / Project RM 1.3 and a Black Ice Fusion F159 / Grado Reference Low Output cartridge / VPI Scout. Without the cartridges connected I have a slight bit of air noise when I turn up the volume which I kind of expect. As soon as I plug in the cartridges I pick up what I think is internet noise and not in a small way. The high output masks it to a point, the low output can't be used at all. It sounds like I'm on a spaceship! It's a high pitched noise with a morse code like beeping sound, a lot of background kinda rumble/flutter and distortion. The room is wired for ethernet but as yet not connected I only have WiFi in use. When I switch to any other source input on the main preamp all noise goes to silence. I have connected the phonos with different cables from Transparent Audio, Morrow, Original phono cables that came with the tables and even tried an old set of Monster Cables; all produce the same result as soon as the cartridge is introduced into the loop. 

Has anyone come across this I'm truly stumped?  

K

skyy75234

Showing 2 responses by mulveling

mulveling's avatar
mulveling
2,133 posts
 

Sorry OP, I know how frustrating analog issues can be.

When I had an Audio Research Reference 3SE Phono, I found its High Gain mode highly susceptible to noise from my plasma TV an adjacent room. It sounded like demonic gargling noises (lol). Other MC phono stages, like Herron VTPH2A, were not susceptible to this noise. Using the Ref 3SE in Low Gain more with a SUT was completely immune to the noise. Interestingly, the Ref 3SE has an acrylic top - to show off the nice insides. It looks like your Black Ice Fusion F159 also has a non-metal glass or acrylic faceplate? Perhaps that’s related to this issue. By contrast, SUTs are generally extremely well shielded.

Grados are also known to be poorly shielded. I suppose the noise can inject itself anywhere there’s a weak spot in the chain, and the lower the signal level at its injection point (cart, tonearm, MC stage), the worse it manifests.

Anyways, high chance that MC stage is contributing (faceplate). Then on your JD9 - I always wondered about that unit’s specs - they seem to be impossible, or frankly made up, but nobody seems to question it. 70dB gain MM mode, 95dB MC mode, 100dB signal-noise? That’s literally impossible. I wonder what is the actual gain on these units? If the spec were true, you’d never need to run MC mode except for something like a 0.05mV Ortofon MC2000.

mulveling's avatar
mulveling
2,133 posts
 

@skyy75234 

That's fair. I'm sure the JD9's sound & work great - just the specs always struck me as clearly "wrong". Probably a mistake that was never corrected. One of my first audiophile components was their JD100a CD player, and I remember it sounding GREAT. The Envoys were well beyond my reach at that time, but wow did they ever seem exotic and awesome!

Yep, as you know, I'm pretty much exclusively MCs. I totally get not being into the higher end Ortofon sound. I love some of their lower models for the money, but at the Black level - yeah I get it. 

I've got no experience to draw from on high output MI's, but SoundSmith's high output MI models seem to be the obvious choice here. I'm not clear what the actual advantage is to their low output versions, given there's no moving coil mass like with MCs. And in your case, fighting noise, the high output versions are the clear choice. I've got a friend in Singapore with similar tastes to mine, and a large MC collection too, who absolutely loves his SS Boheme (HO, discontinued model). The SS high output carts are in my list to try at some point :) 

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