Gain Question

Actually, I don't know that it will get you that much more gain, considering you will need to run it through your MM input and not your MC input of your Herron. The cartridge will put out a higher signal, but your phono stage will lose about 20 db of gain switching from MC to MM. It could help a little overall though, it's certainly worth a try.

Cheers,
John

You can either get a cartridge with higher output, get a phono stage with more gain, or get a preamp with more gain OR some combination of the above.
Actually, there are two other options, get more sensitive speakers and/or get a more sensitive amplifier(s).

That's the only options I can think of for you to 'fix' this.

Cheers,
John

Al, actually his Cary SLP-05 preamp has 10 db of gain single ended but only 8 db of gain balanced. I know, this seems odd.

According to their website, the Harbeth 40.1 has a sensitivity of 84db/1W/1M.

You could use a SUT, but it would probably overload your MC input on your Herron. You could however run it into the MM input. If you got a SUT with 30 db of gain, and ran it into your MM stage with a gain of 43/48 db, you'd have a total of 73/78 db. This could give you as much as 12 db more gain before the preamp.

Cheers,
John

Summed up very well Markus1299. Don't be hard on yourself though, we all learn as we go through this journey together. It's not the destination, but the journey itself which enthralls us. (I take it that means the Clearaudio Virtuoso didn't work out?).

If you go looking at another cartridge, you may find this thread helpful in understanding the difference between the two standards in which cartridge output is measured. Using this formula you can compare cartridge specs as apples to apples, instead of apples to oranges.

Cheers,
John