Need some suggestions for a preamp for a record player.

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Ptownkid

Well-known member
Joined
Feb 1, 2005
Messages
4,256
Location
Ajax, Ontario, Canada
Finally got my living room set up in such a way that I could get a record player set up, however, since todays electronics companies have neglected to care about those of us that still enjoy vinyl.....my receiver has no phone input.

I need a preamp, hopefully simple and clean, to go between the receiver http://www.yamaha.ca/av/Receivers/HTR5850S.jsp and the record player.

Any thoughts?

I'm also thinking that I may need a simple eq as well, as i don't feel like adjusting the receiver every time I feel like vinyl.
 
search shure preamp on ebay, i just saw a couple there. they have the riaa curves built in so you won't need an eq, this should give you an idea of what to look for at least.
Sleeper
 
Are you looking for an off the shefl preamp, or kit, or a circuit to build?

Here's a couple I really like. The Hagerman is available as either a kit or assembeled - he also offers a tube phono-pre. I have the Bugle Pro, same circuit but with a pwr supply and flexible eq in a box.

http://www.hagtech.com/bugle.html#bugle

This is a really, really nice tube kit.

http://www.bottlehead.com/et/adobespc/Seduction/seduction.htm

-tim
 
Simple DIY and surprisingly good : http://sound.westhost.com/project06.htm

Ready to use and not too expensive : http://www.nadelectronics.com/hifi_amplifiers/pp2_framset.htm

Cheers,
Mike
 
check this link:
http://www.triodedick.com/

choose projects and phonodude

It´s a DIY tube preamp which is supposed to be the highest highend stuff. I hate to use those mistreated words but it´s definitely the best RIAA pre I´ve ever heard. A friend of mine who is a audiophile with a Hifi system worth a house built them and let me listen and compare them to some other highly regarded pres. And phonodude made it.
word :grin:
 
[quote author="SALSA"]Simple DIY and surprisingly good : http://sound.westhost.com/project06.htm

Ready to use and not too expensive : http://www.nadelectronics.com/hifi_amplifiers/pp2_framset.htm

Cheers,
Mike[/quote]

I have that NAD PP2 at home. It works well and sounds good. I suspect it is a based on a simple 5532 type opamp circuit like the DIY one suggested above.

And it is inexpensive, which is nice.

Chris
 
[quote author="crm0922"]
I have that NAD PP2 at home. It works well and sounds good. I suspect it is a based on a simple 5532 type opamp circuit like the DIY one suggested above.

And it is inexpensive, which is nice.

Chris[/quote]

I have learned to respect NAD stuff over the years---the original designer (the name escapes me but he was one of those scandanavian blokes iirc) was brilliant at cost-effective decent quality stuff. No less that Keith O. Johnson endorsed the initial pioneering product, the little 3020 integrated amp---when he recommended it to me his words were "I didn't have to do anything to it to make it sound right." Vintage KOJ. :grin:

I wouldn't be surprised if the PP2 has some good discretes in it. My NAD model 1000 preamp turned out to have some of the super-low-rbb' Toshiba bipolars in its phono input stage.
 
[quote author="Sleeper"]search shure preamp on ebay, i just saw a couple there. they have the riaa curves built in so you won't need an eq, this should give you an idea of what to look for at least.
Sleeper[/quote]

I picked one up for a few bucks, but haven't had a working turntable to try it out with. Its very basic, just two transistors in a BJT pair per channel. Now that I think about it you could build this for a couple bucks, so the Shure is only worthwhile for the cute little box.
 
[quote author="SALSA"]Simple DIY and surprisingly good : http://sound.westhost.com/project06.htm[/quote]

I think i may do that one, but I'm a little lost, it talks about NE5532's, but shows TLO72's...
 
[quote author="Ptownkid"][quote author="SALSA"]Simple DIY and surprisingly good : http://sound.westhost.com/project06.htm[/quote]

I think i may do that one, but I'm a little lost, it talks about NE5532's, but shows TLO72's...[/quote]

The schemo with the 5532s is all the way at the bottom of the page. scrolling.....scrollling... :razz:
 
> I need a preamp, ... I may need a simple eq as well, as i don't feel like adjusting the receiver every time I feel like vinyl.

??? You get a phono preamp. You shouldn't need to re-EQ, or not more than the sloppy balance on some old phonograms demands.

> hopefully simple and clean

It is possible to make a very-very good phone preamp, simple and cheap.

Nobody does.

TAA/AudioXpress reviewed a pile of low-price phono preamps a few years back. With one exception, they were all awful. Terrible EQ accuracy, gain too low or too high, bla-bla. One caused the power amplifier to shut-down, which they blamed on RF oscillation.

It happened that I'd bought that exact model preamp the week before the review came out. And indeed, when I set the system volume control so an average piano recording played through ordinary speakers reproduced at realistic level (this is a piano studio so I could tell what was "realistic"), the amp shut-down.

It was actually subsonic random noise. So bad, I could see the needle waggle on my VTVM set for 1.5VDC. The amplifier thought it was DC and was going to blow the speaker. It wouldn't, but the protection didn't know it was random noise instead of a problem getting worse.

The ONE good low-cost preamp in the review was Hagerman's battery-power kit. While I would not do a phono preamp that way, it is absolutely right-on for noise, EQ, distortion, output. And I've used 8V-battery-power preamps: it really isn't a pain keeping them fed. A preamp draws very little power, and in normal record-playing the batteries last months.

The little tanks that Radio Shack sold for decades were all awful. Someone still sells them, may be Parts Express.

Those Shure boxes were barely acceptable for listening-lab duty.

PAT2/3, PAT4 suck bad. Marginal EQ accuracy, horrendous subsonic instability.

Two transistors is NOT enough.

PAT5 is not bad, not as cheap as it used to be. More than you need.

If you want to play records, just get the Hagerman kit.

If you want to putz around a little, I like 5532 with RIAA feedback. There are tradeoffs with feedback RIAA EQ, but no real problem.

The absolute best phono preamp I ever used was modded from a very old TAA project, three transistors and an enormous emitter cap. That was a lot of putzing around.
 
[quote author="PRR"]You get a phono preamp. You shouldn't need to re-EQ, or not more than the sloppy balance on some old phonograms demands.[/quote]

I don't quite understand what you mean by that...

As of right now, I have to crank the volume in order to be able to hear records at an acceptable level, and i have to turn the treble down and the bass up on my reciever. Maybe that's a cranked volume thing, maybe it's a bad needle thing, but that's why I said I may need some eq OUTSIDE of my receiver as I don't want to adjust everytime.

I want a preamp that I just hook up and ignore, never have to touch it, between the turntable and receiver.

Thanks for all the info though
 
Yes, you need a phono preamp, one designed to do two things:

1) Provide a bunch of gain, and

2) Add the equalization necessary to compensate for the equalization built into the recording, which is known as the RIAA curve. This equalization is fixed, not adjustable, and has been standardized since 1955.

Phono preamps exist -- Radio Shack sells an okay one, Hagerman sells a good one -- and they are plug-and-play. No adjustments needed once you get it set up.

Peace,
Paul
 
I'm thinking I'm gonna go with the hagerman, but I'm a little put off by the $40 price tag for a pcb...I think i may lay one out myself.

The other thing i may do, is buy the bugle pro kit. It's $89, but at least it's 2 pcbs and two faceplates, which seems like a much better deal. However: it seems like over kill.
 
I built the RIAA preamp on Rod Elliot's website, the same one mentioned in some previous posts. It works just fine for what I am doing and is indeed pretty quiet. The only changes I made were adding a regulated supply onto the PC board and used an AC wall wart and 1/2 wave rectifier to get my split supplies. Since it draws so little current it doesn't take much filtering to get rid of the 60 cycle ripple, and the regulators look after the rest. I used the 5532's though rather than the 072's.
 
I've had good luck with the Rolls

http://www.rolls.com/data/vp29man.pdf

preamp and have that same simple circuit now in my Empire Troubador TT to plug into a line level. The Rolls claims ot have better than 80Db SN and I believe it. Very quiet and seems to have very good RF and AC magnetic immunity. No hum. The bad news is that it uses a wwart. Whatever you do, make sure it is well shielded.

The pfantones you see on ebay are convenient and run off AC, but the one I have right now on a vintage 1019 hums a bit.

.


bbob






http://microphonium.blogspot.com/
 
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