Douk Audio T3 PRO Tube Phono Preamp for Turntable, MM Phonograph Preamplifier, Mini Valve Stereo Preamplifier for Record Player

Product Information

If you find the appearance basic, the performance is going to blow your mind. Among its winning talents is the well-timing. Fono Mini A2D enhances music with passion and properly aligns beats making it unbeatable by its competition. Watts is the standard measure for power. Though most electrical appliances have labeled Watts, you need to be cautious as most manufacturers aren’t trustworthy to boost sales. I used all audio grade (in this case Jantzen) capacitors as bypass capacitors and only quality electolytics. The output capacitor should be a "poly" cap for best results. The ones I used were Jantzen Silver Z as I like the way they sound. These are physically large so keep that in mind when designing your layout. For the inter stage coupling capacitor I used an Auricap however in both cases, other quality brands ought to be satisfactory. In both instances the capacitor will tend to "flavor" the overall sound. If you know how they sound and like some other brand, by all means use them. I already had the fan, 40mm dia. with brushless motor and very quiet, provided it's on reasonably flexible mountings. The power supply uses a VT426, where only the 240V and 15V windings are used. The 15V winding provides the supply for the fan and the front panel lamp, also a stabilized 12.6V DC supply for the valve heaters. These are wired in series/parallel to match, see diagram. Smoothing of the HT supply is by twin series pi filters, using 100µF capacitors with two miniature smoothing chokes VT1314. The low DC resistance ensures maximum HT for the amplifiers (300V). Despite being unregulated, ripple is so negligible that it could not even be theoretically demonstrated by Duncan's PSU Designer. The simple answer is that if a phono preamp has a volume control, it’s doing something separate to the actual signal conversion process. In the case of the Alva mentioned above, it’s controlling the volume of the headphone amp output. You occasionally will find other preamps that have volume controls, and they too are using them to control something separate from the phono conversion process.This Graham Slee Accession preamp, for example, has a volume control to help with its digital conversion stage. This is useful for those who are digitizing vinyl.

We love the scale of performance and the way the Vertere delivers the seismic dynamic shifts of the recording with so much enthusiasm. As with the previous generation (also an Award-winner), our main takeaway after hearing this phono stage is that it makes listening to music interesting and, where appropriate, fun. There’s not much we can ask of any piece of hi-fi beyond that. Both triodes of V1 are connected in parallel, initially to minimize noise. Furthermore the Octal valve has an advantage over the miniature Noval type by virtue of having much larger area electrodes. The anodes of the 6SL7 are easily 4 – 5 times larger than those of an ECC83. In theory at least, a pair of 6SL7 triodes in parallel should produce much less noise than a paralleled ECC83 pair could manage. For additional tube amplifier design and construction tips, see the design and construction tips and suggestions for vacuum tube amplifiers. Also, I have posted some suggestions for a tube amplifier wiring color code that you can use during construction. It’s effortless to use since it comes with no power switch; the process usage entails plug-in and play. After connecting to the amplifier, a small red LED shines to signify it’s on and ready. A phono preamp, phono stage, or turntable preamp is an audio element for amplifying the signal from a turntable. This way, you can easily connect it to a modern sound system like an MP3 or CD player.

A parameter that shows the quality of the product is the signal-to-noise ratio: it should be as large as possible. The main thing here is that the turntable preamp itself has a minimum noise level. Also, a high-quality record player preamp may have (or may not have, and this is not an indicator that it is worse) signal and overload indicators and input switches.

The Blue Note reissue of Freddie Hubbard’s Hub-Tones (Blue Note 80 Vinyl, ST-84115) is a beautiful sounding record and exactly the type of recording that would sell a lot of Croft units. Really exceptional phono stages should make an instrument like the trumpet come alive without forcing you to reach for the remote because the top end has too much sizzle.Squeeze every inch of detail from your record collection with our highest quality moving magnet and moving coil phono stage, with integrated headphone amp; the Duo Phono Preamplifier.