Preamp Deal of the Century

Well, I tried the 24 Ohm RCA loading plugs, and the result was not what I had hoped. Things still sound tizzy, and the 24 Ohm plugs make the sound drier. The match between the Benz Micro Ace medium and my Wright WP200C was superior. I just sold the Wright, and frankly I wish I had kept it.

Not sure how far to chase the phono match on the Cortese...whether it makes sense to upgrade to the Cortese with gain control, or to just buy another Wright WP200C. It'd be less expensive to buy another Wright, although I'd give up an input on the Cortese, which I fully utilize.

Stuck at the moment.

Hello Tvad,

Sorry to hear that it did not work for you. Does the Cortese have a slider switch to choose load settings? Just in case you miss it, when you load the Benz at 24 ohms using the resistor, is the setting on the main preamp set at 47k ohms?

One last thing, when you are using the Wright, are you using a SUT? If so, what was the loading? I asked this because a 100 ohm loading with the Supratek which use Jfet at the input(like a head amp) is different sounding than a 100 ohm load using an SUT. I believe that a 100 ohms load with SUT corresponds to a 1000 ohms load for a head amp to produce the same amount of current to the phono circuit.

If you already tried 1k up to 2k loading and still does not like the sound then, I rest my case.

regards,

Abe

10-01-07: Amandarae
Hello Tvad,

Sorry to hear that it did not work for you. Does the Cortese have a slider switch to choose load settings? Just in case you miss it, when you load the Benz at 24 ohms using the resistor, is the setting on the main preamp set at 47k ohms?

Yes, it has a slider switch, and I had the switch set to 47 Kohms.

I did not use a SUT with the Wright, and I had it loaded with 360 Ohm loading plugs.

Do you believe it would be worth the investment to buy a Benz Micro Ace Lo (.4 mv)?

Mick believes .4 mv output is still a little high for the Cortese without gain control.

I sure like the cartridge, though.

Hello Tvad,

Do you believe it would be worth the investment to buy a Benz Micro Ace Lo (.4 mv)?

It depends on the spec of your Cortese. Maybe it is designed for low output(lower than 0.4 mV)carts. Judging from your descripton of the gain being "too hot", it might well be the case.

Mick should be able to tell you what it is base on the serial number and I am sure he can recommend what cartridge to use for optimum performance. Better yet, ask him what he used to voice out the phono section of the kind of preamp you have.

regards,

Abe

Thanks, Abe. Mick and I are in contact. He doesn't seem to have info on record based on serial number...or he doesn't have the time to look it up, I'm not sure which. My Cortese had a circuit modification which was only discovered after I opened it up and sent him photos. He could not recall if he did the mod or supervised the mod. However, the mod was a re-wiring of one input, and the original input configuration was easily restored.

BTW, sent Kevin Covi an email almost a week ago and have yet to hear from him.