Hi all,

I took a bit of a gamble and bought a valve phono stage off ebay
recently. Upon hearing it I thought the sound was great but lacking in
bass but put that partly down to the equipment I was using it with (home
made speakers that have lived in the loft for 10 years).

I took it round to Keiths on Tuesday and tried it on all his amps and it
was still bass light on his Dynavox and WAD amps but to my ears was
absolutely superb on the triode amp. This amp seemed to bring out the
bass and make the sort of sound I am searching for, something I could
listen to all day with any kind of music.

Here's the pics, 5's my favourite (thanks Keith):

http://www.apah69.dsl.pipex.com/keit...w/mingda01.JPG

http://www.apah69.dsl.pipex.com/keit...w/mingda02.JPG

http://www.apah69.dsl.pipex.com/keit...w/mingda03.JPG

http://www.apah69.dsl.pipex.com/keit...w/mingda04.JPG

http://www.apah69.dsl.pipex.com/keit...w/mingda05.JPG

We did some comparisons with Keiths EAR phono stage and on the triode
amp I thought the Ming Da was better. On the other amps the EAR was best
but for me that was only due to the better bass and myself and Nigel
thought the EAR had too much bass at times.

This phono stage cost me 140 pounds plus 60 quid delivery from China,
and with a few tweaks to get some bass out (suggestions welcome) or the
cloning of Keiths triode amp may be the only one I ever buy.
I make no claims to it being hi-fi but as something to make my music
enjoyable I love it.

Phil

"Phil North" wrote in message

Hi all,

I took a bit of a gamble and bought a valve phono stage off ebay
recently. Upon hearing it I thought the sound was great but lacking in
bass but put that partly down to the equipment I was using it with
(home made speakers that have lived in the loft for 10 years).

I took it round to Keiths on Tuesday and tried it on all his amps and
it was still bass light on his Dynavox and WAD amps but to my ears was
absolutely superb on the triode amp. This amp seemed to bring out the
bass and make the sort of sound I am searching for, something I could
listen to all day with any kind of music.

Why bother with equalizers when you can do more expensive heavy lifting with
tubed amplifiers?

In message , Phil North
writes
Hi all,

I took a bit of a gamble and bought a valve phono stage off ebay
recently. Upon hearing it I thought the sound was great but lacking in
bass but put that partly down to the equipment I was using it with
(home made speakers that have lived in the loft for 10 years).

I took it round to Keiths on Tuesday and tried it on all his amps and
it was still bass light on his Dynavox and WAD amps but to my ears was
absolutely superb on the triode amp. This amp seemed to bring out the
bass and make the sort of sound I am searching for, something I could
listen to all day with any kind of music.

Here's the pics, 5's my favourite (thanks Keith):

http://www.apah69.dsl.pipex.com/keit...w/mingda01.JPG

http://www.apah69.dsl.pipex.com/keit...w/mingda02.JPG

http://www.apah69.dsl.pipex.com/keit...w/mingda03.JPG

http://www.apah69.dsl.pipex.com/keit...w/mingda04.JPG

http://www.apah69.dsl.pipex.com/keit...w/mingda05.JPG

We did some comparisons with Keiths EAR phono stage and on the triode
amp I thought the Ming Da was better. On the other amps the EAR was
best but for me that was only due to the better bass and myself and
Nigel thought the EAR had too much bass at times.

This phono stage cost me 140 pounds plus 60 quid delivery from China,
and with a few tweaks to get some bass out (suggestions welcome) or the
cloning of Keiths triode amp may be the only one I ever buy.
I make no claims to it being hi-fi but as something to make my music
enjoyable I love it.

Phil


Could it be that the higher output impedance of the preferred amp was
decreasing the Qt of the speakers, and therefore giving them a lift in
the bass?

A lower Z(out) amp and a proper bass tone control might be a better
solution!
--
Chris Morriss

"Phil North" wrote in message
...
Hi all,

I took a bit of a gamble and bought a valve phono stage off ebay recently.
Upon hearing it I thought the sound was great but lacking in bass but put
that partly down to the equipment I was using it with (home made speakers
that have lived in the loft for 10 years).

I took it round to Keiths on Tuesday and tried it on all his amps and it
was still bass light on his Dynavox and WAD amps but to my ears was
absolutely superb on the triode amp. This amp seemed to bring out the bass
and make the sort of sound I am searching for, something I could listen to
all day with any kind of music.


:-)

(Cheque's in the post, Phil.... ;-)



We did some comparisons with Keiths EAR phono stage and on the triode amp
I thought the Ming Da was better. On the other amps the EAR was best but
for me that was only due to the better bass and myself and Nigel thought
the EAR had too much bass at times.


Worth pointing out here that Shiny Nigel has the same EAR phono stage and
he's been in two minds about it since he got it. (Lasted nearly a fortnight
before it went tits-up - OK, fixed in an instant at the EAR manufactory some
10 minutes from here, I have to admit...!!)


This phono stage cost me 140 pounds plus 60 quid delivery from China, and
with a few tweaks to get some bass out (suggestions welcome) or the
cloning of Keiths triode amp may be the only one I ever buy.
I make no claims to it being hi-fi but as something to make my music
enjoyable I love it.



'Not hifi, but *enjoyable*'..??? (Now, there's a thought!! :-)


OK, in case anyone is interested, a bit more information:

The object of the exercise was to check Phil's suspicions that the Ming Da
phono stage was a bit 'bass light' and to compare it directly with my
EAR834P phono which has a rep for being a bit fat-arsed and is generally
despised by one here who shall remain nameless. (Won't they Nick? ;-). This
was using a Shure V15 V xMR into B&W DM2As which have got a good bass if
well fed, can be a bit woolly if not and the bass from the Shure can bend
iron bars, if needed..... :-)

Straight off, on material like Bjork and Pink Floyd (even the Beatles at one
stage) it was apparent that the bass was much lighter on the Ming Da.
Whether it was *too* light was another matter, however. The Ming Da
(beautifully constructed inside and out) had/has an extremely pleasant
character of its own (hence the triodes, see below) with a very nice tone
(even on the Chinese valves), superb air and detail and a very 'poised'
overall presentation.

At one stage I was switching (irritatingly :-) between DSOTM and a
beautiful vinyl rip of the same (from another regular here) and, despite no
attempt being made to synchronise the two sources, it was hard to split them
in terms of sound level and overall tonality. This indicated/proved that my
rig with the EAR was not a million miles different to someone else's rig
(same deck, asitappens, different cart and different phono) which was enough
to suggest the Ming Da was the Honda C50 to the two 70's Triumph
Tridents.... :-)

However, not being a devotee of the modern, universally compressed 'digital'
music that is so popular today, I don't subscribe to the theory that 'one
size fits all' and have been in the business of selecting amp/speaker
combinations to suit the various sources for a little while now. (What else
can you do, now that Tone Controls have been phased out...??) My suspicion
was that the phono stage was wanting to do finer things than rattle my
pictures with Bjork's 'Headphones' (which, bless it, it do to a degree!! :-)
so I put it onto the 2A3 SET to try summat 'completely different'....

Bingo! Different story, different picture!! The resultant sound (Joan Baez)
was quite *exquisite* - and one of the records I played was a 1960
original!! (Plenty of fizz but tonally as pure as the day it was made, thus
shooting a lot of silly theories you see spouted here about wear and loss of
treble *right* up the chuff...!!) All I'm going to say is that I could see
someone had been a bit 'quietly moved' by the experience!! ;-)

Unfortunately I hadn't got round to cutting my Line Stage into the equation
until this morning, but having done so now, I suspect the overall boost to
the sound would have found the bass Phil was looking for. (Also swapping the
valves on the Dynavox amp for JJ Tesla EL34s...)

It looks like a repeat session is on the cards....


NP. Benny Carter & his orch. 'Further Definitions'

(No 'recording' - he *is* in the room......!!!)

:-)

Keith G wrote:


OK, in case anyone is interested, a bit more information:

The object of the exercise was to check Phil's suspicions that the Ming Da
phono stage was a bit 'bass light' and to compare it directly with my
EAR834P phono which has a rep for being a bit fat-arsed and is generally
despised by one here who shall remain nameless. (Won't they Nick? ;-). This
was using a Shure V15 V xMR into B&W DM2As which have got a good bass if
well fed, can be a bit woolly if not and the bass from the Shure can bend
iron bars, if needed..... :-)

Must be a usage of "nameless" that I have yet to come across :-)

I was about to start with "despised" being a bit strong, but, no, you
are right, I think EAR phono stages are crap. That ok ?

When I mesured yours, it had a unneeded rumble filter, well that, or the
50hz EQ was wrong, and the response above 10k, fell like a stone.

IMHO, save your money, buy or build the WAD phono.

With all that, having not heard the stage in question, I have no opinion
on that, and how it compairs. There does seem to be two schools to valve
phono stage design, the "sod the RIAA, but it sounds nice to me" school,
or the (one I fit into), "get the RIAA as close as you can, design so
valve changes dont effect this, or can be dialed out, and then look at
the best sound" (valve op points, CCS, component choice, MC loading
values, power supply quality, RF rejection, all that sort of stuff).

However, not being a devotee of the modern, universally compressed 'digital'
music that is so popular today, I don't subscribe to the theory that 'one
size fits all' and have been in the business of selecting amp/speaker
combinations to suit the various sources for a little while now. (What else
can you do, now that Tone Controls have been phased out...??) My suspicion
was that the phono stage was wanting to do finer things than rattle my
pictures with Bjork's 'Headphones' (which, bless it, it do to a degree!! :-)
so I put it onto the 2A3 SET to try summat 'completely different'....


Out of interest, what the input impediances of the amps in question ?
That could well be making a difference. And maybe input capacitance,
depending on the circuit of the phono stage.

--
Nick

In article ,
Keith G wrote:
The object of the exercise was to check Phil's suspicions that the Ming
Da phono stage was a bit 'bass light' and to compare it directly with
my EAR834P phono which has a rep for being a bit fat-arsed and is
generally despised by one here who shall remain nameless.

Ever heard of using a test disc and a suitable voltage measuring device?
That tends to be how you check frequency response...

--
*Why is the word abbreviation so long? *

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

In article ,
Nick Gorham wrote:
Out of interest, what the input impediances of the amps in question ?
That could well be making a difference. And maybe input capacitance,
depending on the circuit of the phono stage.

I'd also be interested in the output impedance of the pre-amp. Does it use
cathode followers?

--
*Never slap a man who's chewing tobacco *

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

Dave Plowman (News) wrote:
In article ,
Keith G wrote:

The object of the exercise was to check Phil's suspicions that the Ming
Da phono stage was a bit 'bass light' and to compare it directly with
my EAR834P phono which has a rep for being a bit fat-arsed and is
generally despised by one here who shall remain nameless.


Ever heard of using a test disc and a suitable voltage measuring device?
That tends to be how you check frequency response...


Yes, that was actually how I tested Keiths EAR. The other way which I
find more convienient for development is a inverse RIAA sig gen and scope.

--
Nick

Dave Plowman (News) wrote:
In article ,
Nick Gorham wrote:

Out of interest, what the input impediances of the amps in question ?
That could well be making a difference. And maybe input capacitance,
depending on the circuit of the phono stage.


I'd also be interested in the output impedance of the pre-amp. Does it use
cathode followers?


That was my point...

--
Nick

Nick Gorham wrote:
Dave Plowman (News) wrote:

In article ,
Nick Gorham wrote:

Out of interest, what the input impediances of the amps in question ?
That could well be making a difference. And maybe input capacitance,
depending on the circuit of the phono stage.



I'd also be interested in the output impedance of the pre-amp. Does it
use
cathode followers?


That was my point...


From http://www.mei-xing.com/doce/pro20.htm

MM input level: 2.5mv
MC input level: 0.5mv
MM input impendence: 47k?
MC output impendence: 100?
MM signal to noise ratio: 91dB
MC signal to noise ratio: 86dB
Output impendence: 100K?

One day I will know what all this means!