A question of loading...

You are showing your ignorance Dover. 47K is not standard for a MC and not standard with the Etna Lambda, which I am listening to as I type this. 47K is the standard for MM. Not for MC.

Actually 47K is the standard input impedance for all phono sections, MM or LOMC.


LOMC cartridges often seem to need lower impedances, but this is really for the benefit of the phono preamp, not the cartridge, due to the reasons Jonathan Carr has talked about, mentioned earlier on this thread.


I've been telling people this for years. If your phono section does not have troubles with the RFI caused by most LOMC cartridges (and the capacitance of the tonearm cable) then 47K will sound just fine.

An additional side benefit will be less ticks and pops, since the phono preamp will generate ticks and pops if the input section is overloaded by the RFI at its input. It is for this reason that tubes have a distinct advantage over solid state, as its easier to designed a phono section using tubes that is hard to overload.

+ 1 Atmasphere.

OTOH, do tubes have a distinct advantage?? I would say that they do when it comes to overall SQ, plus the decreased likelihood of overload, BUT they are never 100% quiet...at least IME. There is always some minimal hiss..and this leads me to believe that their noise floor has to be higher than ss. 

You are showing your ignorance Dover. 47K is not standard for a MC and not standard with the Etna Lambda, which I am listening to as I type this. 47K is the standard for MM. Not for MC.

Actually 47K is the standard input impedance for all phono sections, MM or LOMC.


LOMC cartridges often seem to need lower impedances, but this is really for the benefit of the phono preamp, not the cartridge, due to the reasons Jonathan Carr has talked about, mentioned earlier on this thread.


I've been telling people this for years. If your phono section does not have troubles with the RFI caused by most LOMC cartridges (and the capacitance of the tonearm cable) then 47K will sound just fine.

An additional side benefit will be less ticks and pops, since the phono preamp will generate ticks and pops if the input section is overloaded by the RFI at its input. It is for this reason that tubes have a distinct advantage over solid state, as its easier to designed a phono section using tubes that is hard to overload.

Ralph, as I have said many times you are a great asset and resource to this Board but when it comes to phono stage topics many including myself simply feel you are somehow losing the forest for the trees, to put it politely. First, Jonathan Carr never says anything remotely similar about optimum loading for his cartridges. I am looking at Jonathan Carr's loading chart that came with my Etna as I type this and depending upon the gain setting and the total capacitance of the tonearm wire in interaction with the phono stage and the recommended loading ranges between 104 and 340 ohms for 0dB gain and between 284 and 887 in the highest gain column of +6dB. 
But that is Jonathan Carr who sees things (rightly so) from the perspective of the cartridge manufacturer. Now lets talk about phono stage producers. They don't espouse charts, they talk about listening. Each phono stage manufacturer knows the attributes of their designs. My Manley Steelhead with built in step-up transformers is not going to behave the way a Sutherland 20-20 (just for example) will. 
To say that 47K is the standard or de facto or even starting-point loading for a LOMC is ludicrous. 

Dear @daveyf  : There is no single advantage, today SS phono stages just can't be overloaded in normal condition: comes with very good headroom. That " problem " was a " problem " of the past/several years ago. Everything change SS manufacturers move on because they learn too, they are not sticked in the past as atmasphere.

In the other side in his last post @fsonicsmith is just rigth and if we read the page 3 and 4 in the FM Acoustics link data sheet M.Huber point out easy and important information about.

Atmasphere is sticked with his very old opinion and in several threads here or in WBT was defeated but is his privilege to be sticked there: just does not moves. Who cares? .

Yes, in other audio subjects he is a very good resource as @fsonicsmith  says.

R.

Actually 47K is the standard input impedance for all phono sections, MM or LOMC.

Perhaps Ralph is referring to "industry standards" which are like the  biological artifacts of teets on boars and tailbones on humans. Or better yet, like the silly 1996 standard set by the industry for headphone amps to have 120 ohm output impedance. The audio industry has a long sordid history of setting standards that made little sense other than being convenient at the time and then slavishly and stupidly following them for years until someone brave and brash yelled for truth. People like Charley Hansen for example. How I (and most all of us) miss Charley.