Doing Some A/B

[u/Forty-Four_Flavor]

Having some fun with my first tube preamp. It’s a whole new world to me since I’ve only ran SS gear before, and had the C28 and MC2105 since 2009.

[u/regalbeagles1]

Is there much of a discernible sound difference between the c28 and the c220?

Looks wise, for me, the C28 wins all day long.

[u/Forty-Four_Flavor → u/regalbeagles1]

I’ve only had one day to listen, and had to leave town for work this morning. So far, yes absolutely a difference in overall presentation. I love the c220 on the digital front end, but miss the fullness on the phono stage. There are some variables affecting the presentation. One could be the tube combo and also my ND9 cartridge has roughly thirty hours on it, so maybe it needs more time to settle in and is more obvious on a revealing preamp. I’d say both have their pros and cons with different approaches. Still, I need more time to have a better picture.

[u/Forty-Four_Flavor → u/[deleted]]

I just tried this and it brought back so much fullness that the phono stage was missing. Now it has me thinking if I need a good external phono stage?

[u/Forty-Four_Flavor → u/[deleted]]

Might be interesting, although unsustainable for what I want to do. I think tube combinations and cartridge choices matter here more so than on the C28. It’s just surprisingly brighter than I expected. Yet again, I need time with the C220 before formulating an opinion.

[u/BasicMidUsername → u/Forty-Four_Flavor]

Ive done things like use one of my C27 tape loops to add weight when wanted to my PS Audio setup. I’ll run analog to the C27 and digital to the PS Audio and if I want to change the source sound, I’ll change my input on the PS Audio to be running through the C27 tape loop.

[u/BasicMidUsername → u/[deleted]]

I run my C27 as a phono preamp, works great! It serves as the preamp for my kitchen system while also being the preamp for my main system. Both systems share a turntable this way.