Your cart has a low enough output that it cannot be expected to work its best with a modestly priced phono stage and no step-up transformer. I think SD is right - if want to keep the cart, you should look into improving your phono preamplification situation, rather than depending on having an unusually high gain power amp. This could still involve trying a step-up first, even if you switch phonostages later on in addition. Of course, it might be simpler to just get a medium-output MC cart instead, but simpler in your case might not be better...
Cartridge Loading and Gain
Help! I have an old low output .2mv/1khz/5cm/sec dynavector cartridge, along with a lehman black cube phono stage, batvk5i preamp, levinson 331amp, and innersound eros speakers with active crossover and amp (mk1 version). The innersound amp was replaced, and the replacement amp has significantly lowered gain. While this works okay for cd playback, i now do not have enough gain to play my vinyl at reasonable volume. My question is twofold: what is the correct loading for this cartridge? The cube has a variety of loads for mc cartrdges - 47kohm, 470 ohm, 100ohm, and 80 ohm. I have read that mc cartridges prefer loading in the 100 range but would like some advice on this. I don't think the loading will impact the gain, so part two is, how do I fix this gain issue so that I can enjoy vinyl again with the least amount of capital expenditure?
I see my options as the following: higher output cartridge (I really like the sound of the low output dynavector though), higher gain phono stage (the lehman has 60db of gain and the BAT has 20 db so I'm not sure if I can find a phono stage with that much more gain for reasonable money), three - upgrade the innersound amp (a very expensive proposition) or four - some sort of step up device before the phono stage. I would appreciate any suggestions or thoughts on this matter -
Thanks - Scott
I see my options as the following: higher output cartridge (I really like the sound of the low output dynavector though), higher gain phono stage (the lehman has 60db of gain and the BAT has 20 db so I'm not sure if I can find a phono stage with that much more gain for reasonable money), three - upgrade the innersound amp (a very expensive proposition) or four - some sort of step up device before the phono stage. I would appreciate any suggestions or thoughts on this matter -
Thanks - Scott