Graham Slee GSP Era Gold Mk. V - anyone have it???

I prefer my GS Era w/ Elevator to both the EAR 834P and Rogue Stealth. It sounded significantly clearer and more dynamic in my system.

The EAR & Rogue are terrific units, but in my case, my SET amps already provide a lot of the best benefits of tube amplification. And my S&B transformer volume control really helps maintain the pureity and resolution along with great tone. The two phonos seemed to slightly muffle the transparency and hinder the speed I was getting. Probably just a synergy thing and not a true trait of those phono pre's since no one else seems to have experienced this.

heard one at a dealer yesterday w/ the shelter 501 and some step up tranny.

this is one fine phono stage !!!!

I had the rogue. It is not in the same league as the GS.

I was reading the Stereo Times review on the new Music Man Classic cartridge and was suprised to read that the Mk V could not pass all the info from the cartridge while the Graham Slee Reflex had no problem and was used to develope this new cart.

I bought both a GSP Era Gold MkV and an Ear 834P and lived with both for a couple of months. Each had its strong points, and I could see how some people might prefer the Ear. But I preferred the GSP's speed and slam.

I saw in Audio Asylum discussions that there are some effective and not-too-expensive upgrades that can be made on the Ear, mainly upgrading capacitors and resistors and putting in better tubes (Telefunkens are probably best). After making those changes, the Ear 834P improved so much that it clearly bested the GSP (to my taste). But the Ear is more expensive to start with and if you have someone else do the upgrade on it, the Ear becomes about twice as expensive as the GSP.

So the GSP remains the champ at its price level, and better than many preamps costing 2, 3, 4 times as much.