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Will our MC for the festivities gain the stage?

Those of us who own preamps with phono stages are familiar with the phrase, “will handle MM cartridges and most MC cartridges”. The word “most” becomes critical when considering many of the low-output pickups available. My Kora Eclipse, for example, has separate MM and MC inputs and the MC stage is rated at .4mV/100ohm with a gain of 55dB. At what point is that 55dB gain insufficient to handle EFFICIENTLY a very low-output pickup? .5mV, .6mV? I know that it does depend upon actual output of the pickup and there are no hard and fast rules. I was given the following general guidelines some time ago which I post below. Does this seem like a good “rule of thumb” or is someone prepared to give it the finger, instead? Thanks.

0.2-0.5 mV needs 63dB gain
0.6-1.9 mV needs 50dB gain
2.0-5.0 mV needs 37dB gain
4yanx

Showing 3 responses by 4yanx

4yanx OP
1,576 posts
 
I am not sure what I am geting from the line stage, Tom, but I will check. But, if I am getting the same 20dB as you are, then I would have a total of 75dB and be in the same "league", no?
4yanx OP
1,576 posts
 
Yes, Marty, I had had been in e-mail discussions with Tom with respect to the Shelter pickups, among others. I posted here because I thought others may have the same general issues.

I had come to some conclusions, based on faulty info I had received stating that the gain for the MC phono section in my Eclipse was 70dB. I have since found out from Kora that the actual rating is 55dB. As such, the suitability of the Shelter came into question. I had not figured on the "additive" effect of the line stage gain and have a message in to Kora to determine this specification (the manual only provides line input S/N of 112 dB).

If the gain of the line stage is in the 20dB range, added to the 55dB of the MC phono stage, I am assuming that things should be hunky-dory, given the .4mv/100ohm specs of the MC phonostage in conjunction with the attributes of the Shelter.

Does ANYONE have any thoughts as to whether the general guidelines for gain posted above have any relevance?
4yanx OP
1,576 posts
 
Thanks, G m c. Almost caught a buzz in my gain head from that!
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