valve phono stage.

And he isolated all other variables (record wear, cart/record temperature etc.) before arriving at that conclusion?

Does anyone here own a tonearm that can accurately adjust downforce by 1/500th of a gram?

:bs:

DT

 

I bet Roy Gregory does .

 

:lol:

 

Do you remember his 'Forgotten Factor" article? He concluded that VTA adjustments of less than 0.018 mm from the ideal made vital differences to the sound, when vinyl records can vary from 1 to 4 mm in thickness!!!!

 

Audible differences, or oscilloscope differences?

Again, far too many variables to form a reliable observation

DT

 

Grivois,
What do you mean by "correctly loading" a 103. 100ohms or 400ohms. There would seem to be different opinions.
Chris

 

The 103 has a coil impedance of 40 Ohms, so it's loading should be 400 Ohms.

 

Hi,

Experience however suggests that the DL-103 sounds best when loaded with 1K in parallel with around 1nF, if used with active headamplifiers, with Transformers I found the loading is not very critical as such, but the DL-103 needs a fairly high impedance tap with most transformers.

Ciao T

 

I think the 103pro has a coil loading of 40 Ohms, the bread and butter model is nearer 10 if I remember rightly. Mine certainly sounded much better with 100ohms loading than 470ohms. The Pro on the other hand is the opposite way round

 

Another question - is there any advantage to using a transformer and then an MM phono stage rather than an all-active MC phono stage. I am pondering usingan Audio Technica AT-5 transformer and then a missing link MM phono stage instead of my Black Cube SE. What might I gain (or lose for that matter).Any opinions ?

 

I've never heard of a 103 with a coil impedance of 10 ohms, the 103R is 14 ohms. The “standard” DL 103, still in production, has these specs: output 0.3mV, compliance 5cu, internal impedance 40 ohms, recommended VTF 2.5 +/- 0.3grams, spherical stylus. The pro's coil impedance is, I think, 38 ohms. Mine sounded crap at 100 and quite decent at 470 ohms. I'd like to try one at 1K/1nF as Thorsten recommends.

 

Oh God, who mentioned the '103?

:zzzz:

 

So, if you were loaded and wanted to push the boat out, you'd get the LCR module Cole (which these days is only supplied with amorphous cores) and connect it to seperately purchased TX-103's?

That would take you somewhere towards 2 grand, though.

 

Hi,

No, if I where loaded I'd ask Brian to get mine assembled using a pair of 103's from S&B. Remember, there are no LCR Coles on a shelf somewhere. Each will be assembeld for you specifically and you can to a wide degree influence things. I am really the wrong guy to talk about it.

You MUST e-mail Brian Cherry to get final answers to that question. But yes, if I had not already a similar slightly more extreme phonostage at home and had 2K that would probably my personal choice.

Well, you could always buy a Wavac LCR-X2 instead. I'll not draw any comparisons as that would be moot, but if you looked inside both units you would find LCR equaliser modules, high grade MC stepups and ECC88 Mufollower stages (hybrid in the Cole LCR as I feel they are better) in both. You would find electrolytic coupling capacitors in the Wavac and whatever you asked for in the Cole.

Certainly Wavac looks much better. Sonically, never compared them side by side.

Ciao T

 

Got ya, T

 

Send the Arm back to SME to rewire they use VDH internal wire bout £160 and they will check over the arm at the same time