MC phono stage without transformer?

I, for one, did not read Raul's comment as implying that his way was the only way. I believe, as he states above, that he was simply hoping that something in what he said would lend some perspective that might render some future improvement.

Obviously, there are innumerable ways to approach a high gain phono stage, all of which present significant challenges and trade offs. IMHO, rather than concluding a king of the hill design approach, the value of this wonderful thread is in shedding light on the many roads to Rome.

Dear Eldartford: +++++ " My experience suggests that, at an "affordable" price point a step-up transformer makes sense. " +++++

IMHO more than " make sense " : " you have no choice ".

I'm always against " mediocrity " and very special on music reproduction at any link/level on the audio chain. You know, José, Guillermo and I choose to design a Phonolinepreamp/tonearm not just for fun but because we think and our experiences tell us that the most critical links ( all links are important, no doubt about ) in the analog rig are the Phonolinepream and the tonearm ( other than the cartridge it self ) and what is out there don't fullfill my music reproduction targets/priorities in the best way.

I already posted that I would like that everyone could have the opportunity to buy the best Phonolinepreamp ( no SUTs ) ( SS tube or what ever ) at an affordable way but how all of us could " dream " with that when the message to the audio industry is that SUTs are ok.

Here I want to say that it is fully regrettable that many " professional " reviwers support that wrong SUT approach ( at least for me ).
I can understand that many of us are in favor of the SUTs but people like AD or MF or many other is out of question, these " proffesionals " are loosing respect ( like reviewers ) from many of us that with buying those magazines mantain it.
Today many of them ( IMHO )make more harm that good to the whole high end development audio industry and we all will be " paying " for it sooner or latter.
Many of us are only spectators where we can/could be protagonist in many ways other that buy audio items.

+++++ " but what is the reason that you put such great importance in exact RIAA equalization. There are no loudspeakers which have the kind of frequency response which you claim is essential ... " +++++

well, if I take that approach that " why bother for the RIAA deviation ( or other link accuracy ) when through the whole audio chain are greater ones " then my and your system were full of " colorations/distortions " that put us not closer to what is on the recording but far away. I try to put at minimum the distortions/colorations/noises in every single link in the audio chain and I think you do it the same or at least you try it to do it like everyone that cares about music reproduction in an imperfect audio systems environment and analog reproduction medium.

IMHO we have to take care that the cartridge signal " suffer " the less degradation ( looses that you can ever recover. ) at any single link on the audio chain and at the same time that has the less " additions " , we have to try to preserve the signal integrity in the best way we can in our own system environment.
I can tell you that those all efforts about are well worth for say the least.

Other that some designers almost no one take care about RIAA deviation eq. where accuracy is a must to have by any quality performance audio standards reproduction.

Things are that that inverse RIAA eq. accuracy is maybe the great and more challenge in a Phono stage design/execution and very hard to achieve it and that's why almost no one " speaks " about.

Regards and enjoy the music.

Raul.

Dear Raul,

"Dear Ron: As I posted I made a little of research on your audio items just to " imagine " what are you hearing but for what you told here your music/sound reproduction is far from what I can " imagine ", good."

To this posting I can only say, that I which to have your imaginary abilities. It would save me a lot of gas money while going for audio exhibitions or friends, since I could imagine the sound from my listening chair by getting the specs via email...;) sorry for my not so serious comment...

"Ron, I'm sure that you are enjoying your system's performance and maybe what I posted could help you to think and try to improve it."

Thanks for your advice ;)

" My experience suggests that, at an "affordable" price point a step-up transformer makes sense. " +++++

IMHO more than " make sense " : " you have no choice ".

I would rather say the opposit is the case...if you have to meet a affordable price region you have to go for a SS or even integrated circuit desing instead of a good step up...but thats my personal opinion. Some people even say that step up transformers came out of fashion when transistors could have been used with much reduced costs...

Re: RIAA accuracy, although it is true that between room interactions and speaker inaccuracies most systems exhibit gross deviations from flat, the mastering process, not to mention tracking and mixing, typically involves tweeking the EQ as little as .2dB. The fact that most systems editorialize the engineer's work doesn't, and shouldn't, stop us (engineers) from working our art at whatever resolution we are inspired to.

Dear Piedpiper: That's right.

Anyway we can't do nothing about because we don't have any " control " on the recording process we can do things where we have some " control " on it and that is from the very first moment that we take a LP to play with it not before.

IMHO everything the same the more accurate system have a better quality performance.

I make " focus " on the RIAA accuracy and in the amplifier output impedance that IMHO has to be lower than 0.1 Ohms.: this " figure " give us confidence that almost any speaker electrical impedance curve can be handle with out any trouble on frequency inaccuracies ( mistmatch between speaker an amplifier. ), this means synergy and synergy in the right sense of the word not the " synergy " that many " professional " reviewers speak about like: " to use this amplifier you need a " warm " speaker ..., or " you need a soft high frequency amplifier for this speaker ", these kind of examples speak nothing about real synergy but trying to hide a " trouble/distortions " with another kind of " distortions/colorations ": incredible but this is the way those reviewers give us advise about synergy with out to find where are/is the main trouble for that system behaivor!!!

I don't like to accumulate distortions/colorations over distortions/colorations and the like.

Regards and enjoy the music.
Raul.