Aural Thrills Audio Phono Pre

Now that I'm getting a few hundred hours on the caps and other components, it's time for a bit more of a review and a few more pics.

First, Tom at ATA was great to work with. He answered all my questions and helped me make decisions on a completely custom, hand-built, phono stage. As you can see in the first pic, the signal path consists of Mundorf S/O as the output coupling, along with Sonicaps and silver mica caps in the passive RIAA section, with Mills resistors. Electrolytics are used only for the radio frequency filtering, which is outside the signal path. Everything except the Mundorfs are part of the standard 100 dollar upgrade (normal price for the stage is 899, 999 for the upgraded version). Those ran an extra 200 on top of the upgrade. I also decided to go with a choke input on the 274B rectified power supply, and a linear power supply instead of a switching after talking to Tom about the pros and cons of each. I'm also now running his recommended Amperex 12AX7s, which I really like. Into this, I'm running an Empire 2x8 fitted with a Rega arm that's been heavily upgraded and a Shelter 501 Mk II cart using a Baerwald (sp?) alignment for Rega arms. The phono IC comes from the Cardas DIN to custom solid silver cables w/ WBTs, and out from the pre via a custom cable that's a single silver and a single copper 28 ga. OCC strand twisted together w/ DH Labs RCAs and cotton insulators. That feeds out into my Pio SC-05 and out via analog direct into my Mackie's then to my RTi12s @ 850 wpc. So that's the setup.

The sound is very balanced, with many good qualities, and no bad ones that I can hear. The sound stage is quite wide and deep, and instruments have a very nice space, but they sound neither big nor pinpoint. Instead, instruments sound life-sized. Vocals have a good weight to them, and it's very easy to count the number of singers when multiple vocalists come in. A good example of this is the 2nd track on Jackson Brown's Running On Empty, where there's a close harmony between 3 male vocalists. On my old Parasound, I thought it was a weird mix where Jackson's voice was spread all the way across the sound stage. After hooking up the Aural Thrills Audio stage, I was able to discern that it was actually 3 different vocalists in close harmony, with Jackson mixed center, and one voice mixed into the left channel, and one into the right. Female vocals also receive very good treatment. Ella and Aretha are even more engaging than ever. It's especially fun picking out which vocalists have good mic technique, and which one's tend to lean into and away from the mic while singing. Cymbals ring for a ridiculously long time through even the densest tracks, and have plenty of that brassy shine to them that you hear if you strike a cymbal yourself. It's even easy to discern where on the cymbal it's being played, down to how far from the bell the drummer is striking it, and exactly which type it is (ride, china, etc.). Drums have amazing slam, with a deep, tight bass. I find myself listening to Rolling Stone Under Cover just to listen to the drums. Also easy to hear is the ring of the drum head after being hit, as well as the transient from the strike. Bass guitars and bass violas, whether plucked or bowed, sound fantastic. Deep, lots of overtones, just like they're in the room. Acoustic guitars (and all wood-bodied instruments) again sound very realistic. Picking out a small bodied acoustic, or a dreadnought, etc., all are quite readily distinguishable. Violins and other stringed classical instruments have a very slight sweetness to them, but again, the wood of the body is clearly distinguishable especially during solo passages, but also during denser passages. Horns all have their own proper sound, and the breath of the player can easily be heard when wind or reed instruments are present. It's especially fun to listen to pieces with both flutes and piccolos present, since the tonal differences are so readily apparent. Finally, piano pieces sound excellent, right down to the hammer striking the strings. So in short, this pre wasn't cheap, but it's an excellent value. I can't wait to see how it sound after another 200 hours.

And now, the pics.....