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Anyone feel like recommending a preamp?

Rudefilms

Rudefilms

New Member
I would love to hear about your favorite preamps! Tube, Solid, Vintage, New, Hifi, etc?

I will only be using it with my turntable. I currently have a Denon DP 60L Turntable with a Marantz 1060 that I use as a preamp and 2 Marantz MA500s that power a set of Thiel CS3.6s.

Is there any benefit to using a tube preamp with a solid state amp? Should I keep everything solid?

Would love any suggestions or critiques.

Thanks!
 
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Rudefilms said:
I would love to hear about your favorite preamps! Tube, Solid, Vintage, New, Hifi, etc?

I will only be using it with my turntable. I currently have a Denon DP 60L Turntable with a Marantz 1060 that I use as a preamp and 2 Marantz MA500s that power a set of Thiel CS3.6s.

Is there any benefit to using a tube preamp with a solid state amp? Should I keep everything solid?

Would love any suggestions or critiques.

Thanks!
Click to expand...

I would stay solid state. For vinyl you better get preamp WITH tone controls. Ideally you meed MC phono capability.
 
If you're a builder, you can build an Aikido tube pre. The Aikido I borrowed had a nice, detailed, energetic sound.

I thought a Bryston SS pre I tried recently also had a very nice balance of detail, bass, and warmth.

I think there is a benefit to a tube pre and SS amp. Many hybrid integrated go this way to have both tube characteristics as well as a lot of power to push the speakers.
 
80's Yamaha C series have an excellent reputation. I had a C-80 coupled with an M-65 Power amp. Great duo. Keep in mind that any pre that is 2 or 3 decades old will need some attention. I had to re-flow some cold solders on the power supply board and pull controls/board in order to do an effective deoxit/faderlube job.
 
I have a Yaqin MS-12B Preamplifier along with Sovtek 12ax7-LPS and Electro-Haromix 12AU7A tubes. Once you roll the Chinese tubes out it really opens up. Great phono stage and reasonably inexpensive.
 
Tube pre-amp is a good idea as is a good quality SS pre-amp. I really love my Forte model 2 pre-amp as it has a lot of bass drive and warmth with a very detailed but smooth mid-range and high end. It also has a very good phono pre that can handle just about any cartridge due to adjustability. They are not easy to find but can usually be had for around $300 - $400 (sometimes less).
Two of my favorites are the Audible Illusions tube pre-amp (several iterations, but they are all good) and my favorite SS pre-amp is the BAT VK-20. I had a customer who played in the San Francisco Symphony (back when I was a dealer) that bought one of those. I broke it in for him (at his request) and while using it in my system for a few days I was stunned at how nice that pre-amp sounded.
 
Technics SU-A4:


Descendant of the mighty mighty SU-A2, built like a tank, tremendous equipment (including a partially parametric eq), excellent characteristics. Show me a preamp that features an output impedance of 0.2 Ohms…
Frequency response with phono MM:
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Only downside: the thing is quite rare. However, there's a twist: if you can do without tone control, the SU-9070 II (not the first version!) offers a similar experience for much less, and is more often to be seen.
 
I have a solid state Fisher CC-3000 and it's very nice running my Rotel RB-990BX. It can take two turntables and can select between MM and MC. Sounds good, apparently Fisher in the "Studio Standard" days still managed to slip up and make a good component once in a while. It's only weak point is the selector switches, which are inherently fragile; I've already had to do repairs on two of them.
 
What I've I've liked best so far.
Mc C22 CE
CJ ET-3
Juicy Music Blueberry with cream
Gas Thaedra ( restored and modified by Mike Bettinger)
Admittedly limited exposure. I am confident you couldn't go wrong with any of the suggestions.
 
Outside of a very expensive Atma-Sphere MP-1 Mk. 2 tube preamp I used in an all A-S system, the best preamp tube or SS was the Rowland Capri. It could be had with or without a phono section which was said to be very good (I didn't have a TT when I owned mine). Very transparent, all the audiophile terminology applied, plus had a touch of warmth. Was drop dead sexy to look at too.
 
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