Graham Phantom Supreme?


Has anyone done a comparison between the Supreme and the mkII? Is it worth changing and expending the extra outlay?

The main revisions appear to be the bearing housing and an improved magneglide stabiliser (I think the internal wiring was up to a good standard already on the mkII)

There is a company called AudioMax Ltd (approved contractor?) which can perform upgrades from both Phantom I and Phantom II to the Supreme build.
Any experience of this conversion out there ?
Many thanks... :)
moonglum
Dear Moonglum, the connector where the Phantom's armtube is connected to the bearing house consists of 2 connectors - one on each side.
Same with the DIN socket and the connecting phono cable - again 2 connectors.
This makes a grand total of 6 connectors/joints from cartridge tags to phono input RCA sockets.
A Talea, Tr-Planar and many other modern tonearms only have 2 connectors on that path from the cartridge terminal to the phono input - the cartridge tags and the RCAs which go into the phono input.
The Phantom has 4 connectors more.
I have seen Phantoms here in Germany with customized wiring going on the outside of the arm tube and into the phono input.
I have done similar in the past with FR-tonearms and can report that it is ALWAYS a significant gain in micro detail and "air" as well as dynamics.
But it looks dreadful and in areas with heavy radio frequencies floating around you may well pick-up some unwanted "dirt" with the small antenna .....
Cheers,
D.
minimal connection points are highly over-rated. The Graham Supreme demonstrates this quite handily.
Well Rockitman, I guess we all can agree, that even the very best connection do sport at least 2 solder joints and a composite of different material (solder, brass, nickel, phosphor bronze, coating) won't better a bare silver wire which runs undisrupted.
This is a simple picture I guess.
I had the Graham Phantom II Supreme here at my place for 3 days this past weekend.
It is a great tonearm with very good connectors.
The fact that it is that good, doesn't say it won't be better with less connectors interrupting/degrading the electrical flow of a very tiny signal.
If it were mine and if I would keep it for a very long time on my table, I would definitely provide an all-through-direct wiring from cartridge tags to phono input.
The point here is, that this is the start of the chain with a VERY small signal hub (0.2 mV with most LOMCs). Here the signal is the most vulnerable.
After the preamp the signal is 500x to 1000x "larger".
Would wish Bob Graham would consider offering a "hot rod" version of his Supreme with non-detachable arm wand and all-through wiring.
I bet our eyes and ears would pop in amazement of the sonic improvement.
Just as I have had the experience with a handful of other tonearms before.
minimal connection points are highly over-rated. The Graham Supreme demonstrates this quite handily.
How so? The only way to know would be to compare a single-wired Phantom Supreme to a standard-wired one, which no one has done AFAIK.

The problems caused by additional connections go beyond increased capacitance or resistance. At the atomic level, each material boundary presents a barrier to the unimpeded flow of electrons. Diffraction at a boundary is inevitable and varies in proportion with frequency, it's basic physics. Sonically speaking, the more boundaries, the more mud.

A single crystal conductor presents the fewest boundaries. Insert multiple crystals and you get multiple diffractions. Insert different materials and you get even more diffractions.

I agree with Dertonarm that a single-wired Phantom Supreme would be an experiment worth hearing.