What's a phonostage, and do I need one?


Help a newbie make the right decisions. I'm almost finished putting together my beginner stereo system. All I have left is deciding on my turntable. I've been looking at the Audiogon discussions and pretty much decided on a Music Hall MMF-2.1 or 5 (I'm leaning towards the 5). My system is powered by an old Marantz 2270 (70 watts). It has a phono jack. One of the discussion threads concerned someone whose phono output was only putting out 1/2 the volume of his other sources. My question is, if I'm using my old receiver, am I going to need to purchase something else on top of what is included with the MMF-5 (or 2.1) for my turntable to sound comperable to my other sources? (my other sources are a marantz CC3000 5 disk changer and an old Nakamichi tape deck.) Thanks in advance.
nicko

Showing 1 response by sdcampbell

In the 1970's, I had a Marantz 2270 receiver, and a Dual turntable (with Shure V15 cartridge). As Sid notes above, the phono stage in the 2270 has adequate gain to handle most moving-magnet and moving-iron cartridges (Grado cartridges), but it will not handle low-output moving coil cartridges (although it may have enough gain for high-output moving coils).

If you don't mind an unsolicited suggestion, it is probably past time for an upgrade from the 2270. While the 2270 was a very good receiver in the early days of solid state electronics, it is by now very dated. Since you are getting a new turntable, and therefore are presumably interested in having a high-resolution audio system, your next step in upgrading your system should be your receiver. Fortunately, there are some good receivers and some excellent integrated amps (if you can live without the tuner) available today. Look through the Audiogon archives for suggestions about receivers and integrated amps.