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Old 09-06-2021, 07:00 PM
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prepress prepress is offline
Semi-audiophile
 
Join Date: Aug 2010
Location: Brooklyn, by way of Nashville
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Quote:
Originally Posted by miner View Post
I have a C2300 preamp. I first tried the Manley Chinook SE ($2400) but after some QC issues I felt there were too many tubes at work. The improvement was not that incremental to my senior ears. McIntosh makes some incredible built in phone stages. I then read Harry Weisfeld’s (VPI fame) review of the PS Audio Stellar phono stage ($2495 - $1795 after trade of product) and had to try one. It is staying for now - extremely quiet and versatile.
I have a C2300 as well. I'm using the built-in phono, but with a low-output moving iron cartridge (Grado Timbre) I have to turn things up much more than before with the Sonata cart I had before. Plus, the C2300's ground inputs are huge, and the spades on my tonearm cable don't fit around the poles. Maybe I'll look into the JC 3+ or the Stellar you mention. I'm sure neither is worse than the quite good phono stage on the 2300.

For what it's worth, The Mac MP100 phono preamp offers a "slight improvement in sound quality and functionality" over the C2300 phono stage (Mac's reply to a question I e-mailed them).
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Last edited by prepress; 09-09-2021 at 05:18 AM. Reason: added info
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