Looking for a phono stage

Yes I bought pmacs 1200 and also had a 1201 on demo when they came out. Both nice but a bit safe sounding for me. Smooth and relaxing would be my lasting impression but I like a bit more energy especially in the top end however in the right system either could be a fine choice.
Totally agree regarding the 1500 but that really is in a different league sonically and price wise.

Any suggestions for a stage in the Ā£600 price bracket? Dynavector and Rega Ariel maybe s/h?

Current deck and cartridge being Rega RP6 and exact, so not that special probably by a lot of your standards.

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I got a used pro ject at half the retail 700.
Pretty decent.
Some on here have had them and recommend. Some will say itā€™s a piece of junk and avoid.
Just go for one option and run with it or youā€™ll be forever wondering what else exists.

(Itā€™s the phono box rsā€¦ can upgrade with a spendy power supply. )

I had a Pro-ject Tube Box DS for a while - quite liked it and it was well below budget new. I believe there is a bigger brother (DS2) which is more monies, but I donā€™t know anything about it.

Yer man from Pinchbeck might know - he used to sell them.

Had a Project tube/ss phono stage for a while which had a terrible hum, couldnā€™t sort it at all even with all sorts of grounding experiments, so returned it. Check it out first is my advice because I have a pretty straightforward set up and Iā€™ve had no probs with other phono stages.

Very flexible though and other Pro ject stuff Iā€™ve had especially the preamps were great and good value IMO.

My outgoing stage was an Ifi iphono, pretty good so think the project might be a side step

The Rega Aria is a good call if you like the Rega way of doing things. I like and use an Exact myself, but only into the Rega Fono mk2. The Exact is very much good enough to take advantage of a better phonostage and then if you want to move to MC later the Aria has that option.

Whest PS.20

And by coincidence I just happen to be selling one for Ā£400 :smile:

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Trigon are good - I love mine I does.

I upgraded to the Advance from the Vanguard II which was very good but I notice there is Vanguard III as well.

Trilogy 906.

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Good call. I like my 907 and the 906 is nearly as good for 40% of the price. The only problem is that you donā€™t see used ones come up very often.

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http://www.hifibroker.com/index.php/analog/trilogy-906-detail

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Oh yes you do :joy:

Thanks for the tip off, will give them a call tomorrow to see if itā€™s still around. Missing vinyl!

907 here too; very good as is all the Trilogy gear Iā€™ve heard

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I had Aria on loan from a friend. At that time I had an RP6 and a Sony DD. The Aria is a nice phono stage and there certainly was a synergy with the RP6. I compared the same cart on both decks and preferred Aria with the RP6 (the cart was a Denon IIRC).

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He is based in Spain even though the registered address is UK. I have bought from him before with no issues.

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