SUT help

Ralph, You should know by now that in my case you are preaching to the converted. I do not now own a SUT. Nor have I ever owned one. Furthermore, except for one amplifier I built myself from scratch for the fun of it and because I came into a pair of fine vintage output transformers, I have never used a transformer coupled tube amplifier. But all that is part of a personal belief system that I keep to myself (except for now), and I would not foist it on anyone else who likes to use a SUT.

I also now have two very fine phonolinepreamps (to use Raul's parlance), one basically tube and one all SS, both of which have sufficient active gain for any MC on the planet, which is to say the Ortofon MC2000 at 0.05mV output can be accommodated by both with no intercurrent audible noise.

lewm

how is the .05mv increased to MM signal strength?

Active Gain, signal not stepped up?

Using low impedance MC carts, I would highly recommend looking into a Sutherland Engineering SUTZ. Which is a step up transimpedance unit made to replace the internal solutions of your favorite phono preamps. Just put this between the cartridge and MM input, exactly like you would incorporate a step up transformer. I have improved a number of tube phono preamps, to include Allnic H-7000 (with silver step ups), Manley Steelhead, and most recently an Allnic H10000. A truly incredible device with a 2 fold benefit. Add transimpedance to the system and improve transparency over any step up transformer I have tried to date.

Seems I poked the beehive with this topic 😅.

I appreciate all the varying perspectives here. Has given me things to consider.

Elliot, The phono stages in both of my phonolinepreamps have sufficient gain to handle any LOMC cartridge. I am going to generalize and say they both produce a total gain (including linestage gain) of more than 75db, probably more like 80db. They are both fully balanced designs. (One is my modified Atma-sphere MP1; the other is Raul’s 3160 Phonolinepreamp which can be configured for either of two levels of MC gain.) No MM stage is involved. 80db applied to the MC2000 output is enough gain to drive my Atma-sphere amplifiers with room to spare, and the amplifiers drive Sound Lab 845PX speakers which I have modified to make much more efficient than stock. To the OP: I have no beef with SUTs. I have heard SUTs do a fantastic job paired with an excellent MM stage. I just chose not to go that route. I can’t even give you a good reason why, except maybe I am a cheapskate.

I've experimented with "transimpedance" stages, and I prefer the above two preamplifiers to what I have heard in my system.  Let's call them "current driven", not transimpedance, because the latter term implies that impedances make no difference. They do, or it does make a difference.