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review iPhono 2

I must be slow as I could not find a link to place this as a review. 

So, I have written about the 1st gen iPhono in the past, comparing it to the very fine Coincident phonostage which I believe is about $6k. I preferred the iPhono but I could just as easily imagine someone else going for the Coincident unit. In that review I thought the Coincident had a better sustain, decay and bloom while the iPhono was hands down the winner in the prat department. The iPhono made my feet move, the Coincident, not so much.

Later on I added the iPower to the fray and the iPhono shored up the areas it lacked. As a former owner of the very very nice Graaf GM70 I was a bit surprised and dismayed when I finally received the iPhono and heard it once fully run-in. I would not have shelled out the thousands of dollars I paid for the GM70 and the vintage NOS tubs I purchased to make it sing, oh and the $1600 I had to spend on the Ortofon ST-80SE SUT to use with the MM inputs of the Graaf as I could not get it quiet enough to tolerate with the MC inputs. The very small $400 iPhono basically did everything the Graaf did (with the iPower that is).

My reference phonostage for the last few years (and probably many more to come) is the fabulous AMR PH77 and I’m running it with a set of Bendix 6900 tubes which elevates its performance even more than the already stellar stock configurations performance. In comparison to my PH77, I found the 1st gen iPhono to be a bit thin and during crescendos it could become a little ragged. Still, it remained in my arsenal as a handy and trusty back-up. The PH77 is of course tubed and as we tube owners know all too well, sometimes they fail and you are down for a while.

Compared to most phonostages I have heard, some of them costing up to $9k I found the 1st gen iPhono to be able to hold its own in some cases crazy as it may sound it was just plain better. I believe AMR intended the iPhono/iTube to be used in conjunction as a sort of baby AMR PH77 and I ran it that way for some time and yes, it does share that familial DNA when it comes to sonic signature.

Move forward some years and I have in my possession the iPhono2 and the iTube 2. To say that the iPhono 2 is better than its predecessor is far too simple a statement. Mr. Fremer thought it to be at least twice as good as the original. I would agree with his assessment. Out of the box with the included iPower is shows far more prowess in the areas of bass but otherwise is pretty close to the original. After about 20 hours a bit more fluidity begins to appear. Again at the 100 and about the 340 hour mark big jumps occur in the areas of fluidity and continuousness. When you get to 480 hours forget about it!

This thing sounds like it has a tube in it, and I don’t mean in that classic overly warm soft rose colored sound that I found so fantastic when I was new to high end audio. No, I am referring to a pellucid but meaty embodiment and rendering of the music. A sound one would immediately associate with MUCH costlier gear.

Most of my listening has been done with my second turntable system which is composed of a Technics SL-1200 GAE with a fully broken in Denon 103R on a LP Zupreme 15 gram headshell and my London Reference. The phono stage then feeds the iCan Pro (best pre I have heard and I have owned 2 MFA Ref units, the baby Ref and the full Ref), the Tube Research Labs GTP 2, and many more. I have had in my system for evaluation the Veloce (battery powered) the Allnic L3000 and many others. From the pre it goes to the custom active crossover and then to a Graaf Modena for the mids, a Harmonix Reimyo PAT777 for the Raal Ribbons and a pair of Acoustic Reality Thaumaturges ($25K when available) for the woofers. The speaker is called the Encore and is my own design. I simply got tired of paying for passive boxes made of MDF with wood screws going directly into the glued wood dust and sold for tens of thousands of dollars but I digress :)

The sound is at once flowing and dynamic. It grabs and holds my attention and really gets my foot tapping. The sound is MUCH more refined and fuller than the original iPhono with no hint of raggedness during large scale bombastic music. For instance it scales far more convincingly on some of the more challenging passages in Hans Zimmers wonderful soundtrack to Gladiator. The original could sound a bit blocky if you take my meaning. It did not have the ability to gracefully scale the mountain so to speak. The iPhono 2 does it with much more ease and refinement.

Here is where it gets interesting. As good as the iPhono 2 is out of the box and it is very very good (and especially after 340 hours or more) in fact far far better than the DS Audio optical cartridge system that I auditioned, it can be made to sound a good deal better. Now this is my own thing, the iFi line of SMPS’s are admittedly super quiet and much better than most SMPS such as the ones inside my apple gear, but I hate them ALL.

I do not like green eggs and.., ahem. Sorry, just flashed back to Dr. Seuss when I thought of my aversion to SMPS’s.

I mean I understand why they are used, efficient,  cheaper to ship and inherently regulated. But they still hurt the sound of my system. As an aside I am actually having a custom linear PS built for my SL-1200 GAE to replace the awful SMPS that Technics installed. So to the point, I replaced the iPower with a linear regulated lab grade power supply. I don’t like hyperbole so I offer none but the result was nothing short of breath taking. There is a great deal more that can be had from that little silver box with a good (and I do mean good) linear supply.

Next I added the iTube 2 to the fray. As I mentioned before AMR always sorta intended this combo to be a baby PH77 as was or may still be mentioned on the iFi site. How to put this; everything I have said about the iPhono 2 up to this point; multiply it by 2 times again. Now you have that sorta living presence that the performers are in your vicinity. Things are rounder, more palpable and it breathes much easier. Again I powered the iTube 2 with a linear supply along with the iCan Pro. Please don’t misunderstand me, I lived with these units powered via there very good SMPS’s for quite a while and they made beautiful music BUT I knew there was much more to be had.

Like Mr. Fremer (paraphrased) stated, to get better than the iPhono 2 you are going to have spend much more and you still may not surpass this unit. I auditioned a $16K current phono stage that people rave over and my ears tell me that it cannot compete with iPhono 2/ iTube 2 combination.  I will not call this a reference phono stage. It is great and I listen to it daily but I reserve titles like reference for the likes of Ypsilon, VDH Grail SB and my AMR PH77. The little combo does far more than I could have imagined. It capable of truly astounding musical reproduction on a grand scale.  

Remember to let it run in for at least 100 (and I suggest 300) hours before you really start to judge it but my guess is it won’t take most people that long to know that this is special gear designed by some super gifted engineers who also happen to actually be able to HEAR. Thanks for reading and I hope this helps someone make a decision one way or the other. Happy listening.


audiofun

Showing 9 responses by lewm

lewm
12,553 posts
 
Mantis-Tobaggan,
Congratulations are in order as you seem to have been successful in taking your audio system to heaven with you.  I hope to try that some day myself.  I have two systems, and I'd like to bring them both.

You speak of the need to ground the output RCAs does not make sense, if you will pardon my saying so.  The output ALWAYS has to be grounded.  In fact, if by some chance the output jack is not grounded within the driving component, it will still be grounded to the audio ground of the component that is being driven, via the ground lead within the IC which connects to the outer (ground) contact of the RCA. Can you amplify on your experience?

What is the cost of an SR Black fuse?  (I just looked it up; $120 from High End Electronics.)  So here we have a very good phono stage that costs less than $500, but wait, it needs a $120-fuse to sound best.  My advice: don't buy any product that uses the word "Quantum" with a capital Q.  That's a red (or black) flag that you are in the hands of a charlatan.

I am not scoffing at the ifi phono2, by the way.  I think it's a great product in its weight class and probably above.

Audiofun, If you are referring to the DSA phono stages, it is indeed quite likely that something was defective when you auditioned it or them.  Those are very fine solid state phono stages; it would be very surprising if the ifi 2 outperforms them, just based on the cost differential and the honesty with which the DSA stuff is constructed and offered to the public (as compared for example to most "audiophile" fuses).  From your description, I offer the possibility that the two channels were 180 degrees out of phase with each other.
lewm
12,553 posts
 
Chakster’s results with the Ortofon MC2000 driving the iPhono2, which supplies 72db of gain, were to be expected. As someone else noted above, the .05mV of the MC2000 would produce 0.2V output. If you connect the iPhono2 to a high-ish gain linestage (at least 10db or better yet 15-20db), then you’d have enough signal voltage to drive most amplifiers. 0.2V won’t get much out of an amplifier, although the cartridge output of .05mV is the measurement at a modest stylus velocity of 3.54 cm/sec (the old standard value, I assume since the cartridge is so old). During music, the stylus moves much faster much of the time (therefore producing more signal voltage than you might think), and sometimes an apparent mismatch between cartridge output and phono gain, like this one, can be surprisingly OK.

My phonoline stage produces well over 80db total gain (probably close to 90db) and handles the MC2000 with no fuss and no SUT. The MC2000 is a one of a kind weird duck, for sure, but worth the effort.
lewm
12,553 posts
 
Dear Raul, I am not quite sure what you meant to say in your original post of 4/16 at 3:22 PM.  If you are saying that bipolar transistors are inherently superior to JFETs, MOSFETs, etc, then I have no dog in that fight.  I would favor whatever sounds closest to live music.  You might be interested to know that I once asked Stan Klyne if he could make any improvements in the design of the input stage of my Beveridge amplifiers, which is all solid state.  (He was interested in purchasing a pair of Beveridge speakers.) Mr Klyne's position was that there would be too much to do, because he would want to use all JFETs.  So, in the realm of solid state there appears to be a schism between those who prefer bipolar and those who prefer one or another type of FET. (I realize that MOSFETs are primarily used as output stage devices in amplifiers, not in phono or linestages.)  I know you respect the Klyne preamplifiers, and evidently they feature JFETs, as do many other solid state phono stages.  I also am not sure what you meant to say about my modified Atma-sphere MP1; I do use a bipolar transistor as the bottom half of the input dual-differential cascode, in the input of the phono section. No FETs anywhere.  Allen Wright used JFETs in his single-ended phono stages and bipolars in his fully balanced RTP phono stage.

lewm
12,553 posts
 
Got it.  Sorry to have been presumptuous. I took the wrong message from your earlier post, but I stand by my opinion about most such devices.  On the other hand, I have never played with the iTube, so I certainly have no basis to dispute what you say. Philosophically, I tend to prefer simplest pathways, and I agree you're better off for having removed a pair of ICs and a pair of RCA jacks from the signal path, if nothing else.

lewm
12,553 posts
 
Audiofun, I am heartened to see that you have dumped the iTube2.  Even though I do use tube equipment, I really do not like and have not liked "stuff" that was invented and sold solely to make the sound of a solid state device sound more "like tubes".  In my experience, that never happens; instead you get an added artificial coloration that really represents some engineer's idea of what tube-o-philes like about tubes.  Kind of like adding a tube-based buffer stage to the output of a CDP that otherwise uses an all solid-state analog stage.  The very idea is almost condescending in its nature.  Anyway, carry on.
lewm
12,553 posts
 
Totem, I have no direct experience with the UA723, but here's what I found on the internet:
"The ua723/lm723 Voltage regulator IC inner circuit using discreet elements. As u can see the output is astonishingly stable at 63W with a ripple of less than 10mV and this goes up to 90W with external pass transistor. As for the ic itself it provides 150mA at 1-37V and there are dozens of circuits involving this particular ic and they include adjustable current limiting capabilities floating regulator switching regulator and many others. Using this chip only and a few external parts one might make a professional power supply unit for under 10$. The ic also provides short circuit protection and many other cool features like overload protection etc if the correct outer circuit is used. I find this little chip very handy because it does not require any particular skills to use end exploit. the only downside is that if any external transistor should fail just dont bother looking for the problem and go buy a new ua723 and a new transistor. Another downside is that it has a gazilion pins and they can be easily mistaken and again the ic fails. So my advice if you are going to use this ic get a few of them (i blew 2 already)be careful with the pin numbers or just use the simpler still quite good for low power applications LM317 :)"

You obviously are not going to DIY, so you need not be concerned about a "gazillion pins".  Sounds like a great part.  I am most familiar with the LM317 as a current source.  Allen Wright used to use it in his SuperRegulator (as a current source).  AW himself advised me to remove the LM317, a few years after I built the kit, and it was good advice.  His regulator sounded better without the LM317, even though it then lacked a constant current source.
lewm
12,553 posts
 
It is really impossible to evaluate any of the optional aftermarket LPSs mentioned above, because all we can know about them is the size of the box and its net weight.  Plus in some cases we are told the part number of an internal voltage regulator.  (I agree with Audiofun; the LM317 is no great shakes, but the LM317 may be used as a current source more often than not.  I don't much care for it in that capacity, either.) But there is much more to a PS than merely the regulator.  Weight is usually proportional to the size of the power transformer, where bigger is usually better, so to some extent knowing the shipping weight is helpful.  For sure, any or all of them will be superior to the supplied SMPS, IMO.

What you want to know is the size of the transformer in terms of its VA rating (higher is usually better and toroidals are good in this application) and the nature of the rectifiers and filtering.  Schottky diodes are the best for rectification.  For filtering, in these types of supplies very typically the filtering is done by capacitors, only. (No inductors or resistors, usually.)  The more capacitance, the better.
lewm
12,553 posts
 
Thanks for your response.  So, I take it that you install the iTube downstream from the iPhono(?)  Whatever works is fine, but I would choose/do choose to use good tube equipment in the first place.  I reckon that if I plug the iPhono2 into the AUX input of my full-function tube preamplifier, I would end up with a nice sounding device that has in effect two phono sections (one built-in plus the iPhono2), sans the iTube. In reading the Fremer review, I got the distinct impression that he was trying hard not to say that he liked the iPhono2 as much as his reference.

I also checked out the PS you use.  What voltage goes into the iPhono2? Do you know whether there is voltage regulation built into the iPhono2 box, or is the regulation normally contained in the SMPS? Sorry for all the questions.


lewm
12,553 posts
 
Audiofun, Thank you for the well written and "intelligent" review.  While I was already aware of the iPhono2 and have recommended it to others on a budget, because of Fremer's praise for it, I was not aware of the iTube2.  Just now, I Googled it, and I find that it is a small box designed to add various sorts of "tube-i-ness" to systems largely composed of solid state devices.  It's a veritable audio Swiss Army knife. So, how are you using it?  I am always suspicious of such devices and the ideas behind them.

Also, is there some connection between iFi products and AMR?
Thanks, again.
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