Yhun, I didn't know you had the MC board. Sorry for the slight diversion, although 47dB gain still sounds like MM territory to me. How much gain in the line stage?
I have the Mu feeding the MM phono stage in my c-j PVll preamp, which has 47dB gain + 19 in the line stage. My cart puts out a "solid sounding" .5mv but 66dB of total gain is not nearly enough. Without the stepups I have to crank the c-j's gain control to nearly 2 o'clock, compared to 9 o'clock for line sources. This pushes the line stage tubes too hard, raises the noise floor and, well, the sound just sucks! :)
If you have to push your gain significantly more for phono than for line then I'd investigate a SU device. I haven't heard anything but the Mu so I can't offer comparisons. People who have A/B'd trannies (Arthur Salvatore) say the Mu is the best in today's market.
I know it has admirably flat frequency response, down only .5db at 20Hz, dead flat to well above 20kHz. That's probably as good as any transformer anywhere. It's dead quiet of course. I haven't heard any phasing problems, but my speakers are probably worse in that regard so it's hard to say. The Mu's integrated leadout wire and easy load resistor changing did it for me. If you're having a slow day you can read my cartridge load test results on a thread called "Shelter + BentAudio Load Test" or something like that. Have the coffee ready. :)
It sounds like your arm wire issues are bigger, but why not try the different load plugins on the CAT? Can't hurt to experiment a little.
I have the Mu feeding the MM phono stage in my c-j PVll preamp, which has 47dB gain + 19 in the line stage. My cart puts out a "solid sounding" .5mv but 66dB of total gain is not nearly enough. Without the stepups I have to crank the c-j's gain control to nearly 2 o'clock, compared to 9 o'clock for line sources. This pushes the line stage tubes too hard, raises the noise floor and, well, the sound just sucks! :)
If you have to push your gain significantly more for phono than for line then I'd investigate a SU device. I haven't heard anything but the Mu so I can't offer comparisons. People who have A/B'd trannies (Arthur Salvatore) say the Mu is the best in today's market.
I know it has admirably flat frequency response, down only .5db at 20Hz, dead flat to well above 20kHz. That's probably as good as any transformer anywhere. It's dead quiet of course. I haven't heard any phasing problems, but my speakers are probably worse in that regard so it's hard to say. The Mu's integrated leadout wire and easy load resistor changing did it for me. If you're having a slow day you can read my cartridge load test results on a thread called "Shelter + BentAudio Load Test" or something like that. Have the coffee ready. :)
It sounds like your arm wire issues are bigger, but why not try the different load plugins on the CAT? Can't hurt to experiment a little.