Phono stage recommendations for Lyra Delos

Are you looking for a tube or SS phono stage for the Delos?

Using a Hashimoto HM7 SUT into Herron VTPH2a for my Delos and XX2 Mk2. They work very well together.

 

I’m sure the Modwright will sound great.

I’m a Lyra Delos user as well, I’m running mine into a Pass Aleph Ono and getting great results. Before I landed on a quality used unit locally, I was seriously eyeing the Tavish Adagio.

 

Hi all. I thought I would circle back here as I did end up ordering a PH9.0X and have had it for a couple of weeks now. After receiving it, I broke it in with the Granite Audio CD for about 75 hours and have been listening up a storm ever since. I'm thrilled with it. That dryishness I was experiencing with the Nova II is definitely long gone, replaced by something much more beautiful to my ears. Thank you for the excellent recommendations!

 

Sweet! Happy listening!

 

What gain setting and loading are you using with the ModWright?

 

I have it set for 54db of gain, 100OHM and am using the XLR out.

 

I agree about not going to a moving magnet over a moving coil. You will lose resolution as well as a certain level of musicality. You might want to try out a Tom Evans Groove phono stage, although it's UK - based and they're locked down over there still. Barring that, a used (?) Microgroove Plus 2. Pretty great sound and after buying Musical Surroundings' Nova 2 last year, I decided to keep the Tom Evans phono stage. (Sent the Nova Back.)
Also, isn't the Lyra a bit on the "lean side"? I had several Lyras back around the turn of the last century: Parnassus, Clavis, and they - pardon the pun - "leaned" towards leanness, especially in the mid/upper bass and lower midrange. Maybe they've changed????

 

The economy seems to be working for mail order just fine regardless of lockdown. As an example two weeks ago I ordered a new wireless modem at 3pm one day and it was delivered at 1pm the next. That is typical.

We're actually due to progressively come out of lockdown in 5 week increments, starting in a few weeks as a result of tumbling indicators partially as a result of lockdown, and partly through 40% of the UK currently inoculated, and increasing at 5% per week.

 

Gain seems good to me but I've never had good results running my Delos at 100 ohms on the Nova II........475 ohms really opens it up and brings in very high dynamics and resolution, but I also use a very low cap cable. It's best to load at the phono stage and not the cartridge, at least in my experience, as I was using a really nice well made phono cable by Morrow Audio a PH6 excellent RF rejection, but holly smokes high cap cable at like 580pf/mt. I loaded the Nova II at its lowest like 30 ohms and was not getting good performance. Then I read up on cable cap and MC and phono settings and read posts by JCarr from Lyra about it.

Replaced the PH6 with AQ Cougar phono cables, not too spendy but capacitance well below 100pf, and then I followed the Lyra loading instructions set at 475 ohms and WOW!!! The Delos completely changed, resolution and dynamics was off the charts, soundstage and everything became super high end. Resolution was the biggest improvement, with imaging jumping all over the place in my room. The details of low end was crazy, I had never experienced Paul Chambers bass on KOB that way before. Loading at the phono stage just allows the cartridge to flow easily in the groove, the cantilever is not restricted from movement, it seems loading capacitance at the cart may stiffen the cantilever, not sure how else to describe the difference as I went back and forth between both cables and load settings......I'll never own a set of high cap cables for my Delos again, what it taught me is to experiment try out all your settings and also follow what the mfg suggests as a start, you may end up there eventually.

The ModWright is twice the price of the Nova II so it should give better performance but more than anything it will give you a different sound character from SS to tube based and more of that warmer character. I don't experience any of this "leanness" described of the Delos, that cartridge will shake my walls easily as well give full body sound, it must be in the loading that some experience a lean feeling......I did have that experience with my AT OC9ML/II, but that is more a house sound of AT carts.

Have fun with the ModWright!!

 

That's a pretty nice review, I don't recall that review. I've been able to measure (roughly) channel separation around 32dB, which I thought was pretty darn good, but this review measured it at 34-35dB which is awesome, guess I need to try tweaking the cart a bit more see if I can improve my results......good stuff to know

Thanks for posting that.

 

My Delos gets nice and deep with the bass.

 

32db is awesome separation, if you ask me.

 

That is all pretty interesting! If I'd read this before purchasing the ModWright, I probably would have tried to copy what you've done on the cabling.