Lehman Black Cube or Fisher 500C?

I'll take a stab. You only need one phono stage, either the one built into the Fisher, which is probably strictly for high output MM cartridges, or your Lehman. Either of those could be run into the Symphonic Line 3. It's probable that the Fisher does not have quite enough phono gain for the Benz Glider, however, but there is no harm in trying. OR you could run the Glider into the Lehman and hence the Lehman into the high level input of the Fisher, and use the latter as your linestage, Assuming you intend to use the amplifier section of the Fisher to drive your speakers, which you have not stipulated, I would personally choose to use the Lehman/Fisher and eliminate the Symphonic, if only to minimize the number of different pieces of gear and ICs in the signal path. You can have lots of fun sorting his all out yourself, but less is usually more in audio.

I would say that the true answer would lie with your speakers and amplifier. If the speakers are hard to drive then I don't think the Fisher will get the job done. OTOH, if the speakers are easy to drive, then what Lewm recommended.The Line 3 is an awesome preamp but would generally be considered nuetral whereas the Fisher would be decidedly euphonic in character, i.e. old school tubey sound.

Dear Lisnr and Jig, Read this review from Stereophile: http://stereophile.com/historical/605fisher/

A restored 500C will at worst compete with the Lehman and Line 3, plus you get a very good sounding amplifier in the bargain. I would not assume that the sonics are "vintage" in any way. Unless you have very power hungry speakers, the 500C would seem to be worth a try. But you have not told us what other amp you own.

OK, Thanks for the input so far guys but I should have completed the scene with the rest of my system. The Fisher was brought in to act as a full featured unit for a secondary pair of speakers which I know it will match up to beautifully: Silverline Sonata 2's (8 ohm with very little variation from it and 95db efficient). This will be fed from the dac of my main system when I'm not simply using the tuner on the Fisher. My main system would not permit the Fisher to power it... Speakers are Apogee Duetta Signatures (approx 83 db efficient and a pulverizing 3.2 ohms +/- a little...) Amps are usually my Conrad Johnson Premier 12's (140 per channel using 4 x 6550's per channel) which is fed into the Apogees after going through an external crossover which splits the signal at 50hz and below into a Rel Stadium 2 sub while the CJ's handle above that into the speakers...
While I'm pretty sure the turntable should sound very nice through the Fisher into the Silverlines,I was hoping to integrate it into the main system as well. So: TT to Lehman to Fisher (aux input?) then the Fisher as a linestage... but that must make it all the way (18') via unbalanced I/C's all the way to my crossover.... which might be limiting on the top-end frequency extension?... I don't know. I was hoping I could skip the Lehman and run TT to Fisher's phono, then out to the Line 3's input and take it from there...
Regardless of all this, that's an awful lot of I/C's..
Maybe I'm better off not trying phono into the main rig and just enjoying it into the Sonatas... I'm sure it will be very nice there....

I am surprised that even the CJ is adequate for the Apogees, since the REL crossover does not have a high pass filter (i.e., the CJ has to drive the Apogees full range, I think). You certainly could try running the Benz Glider straight into the MM input of the Fisher. If you have a talented tech working on the Fisher, perhaps he could even perform a trick or two to increase phono gain, if that proves to be needed at all. I bet the Fisher into the Silverllines will be divine.