Reduction Too Quiet

[tjessen]

So I received my replacement capacitors in the mail today, and with them installed the Reduction is much louder. I send thanks to everyone who assisted me! However, normally listening volume with my reduction plugged into my Crack has me turning the potentiometer to max. Is this normal? If so what do you guys recommend I do to boost the volume. I feel the integration upgrade will not raise the gain enough. Will a preamp do the trick?

 

[Paul Joppa]

I hate to suggest this, it will become a can of worms :^) - but rewiring the Crack for a 6922 in place of the 12AU7 would give nearly 6dB more gain. Add the 4dB from the Integration and you would have 10dB, about 80 degrees of knob rotation. Speedball should add a bit of gain to the Crack as well, I'm not sure how much.

The technical part is that the 6922 runs at the same plate current, plate voltage, and bias (LED) as the 12AU7. This is an unusual coincidence!

 

[fullheadofnothing]

How much music have you listened to with it? How many different records have you tried? Mastering levels will vary greatly; if you've only listened to one quietly mastered record, you could be skewing your results.

 

[Chris65]

The stock Crack 12AU7 uses a 6.3V heater, the heater wiring would need to be changed to use a 6922.

I hate to suggest this, it will become a can of worms :^) - but rewiring the Crack for a 6922 in place of the 12AU7 would give nearly 6dB more gain.
The technical part is that the 6922 runs at the same plate current, plate voltage, and bias (LED) as the 12AU7. This is an unusual coincidence!

Not to open the can of worms too much PJ ;D, but would pin9 be used for a 6922?

So I received my replacement capacitors in the mail today, and with them installed the Reduction is much louder. I send thanks to everyone who assisted me! However, normally listening volume with my reduction plugged into my Crack has me turning the potentiometer to max. Is this normal? If so what do you guys recommend I do to boost the volume. I feel the integration upgrade will not raise the gain enough. Will a preamp do the trick?

Hi Trent, good to hear you got it fixed. I found with the stock Reduction, I was getting to about 2o'clock on the volume on my Crack+Speedball into 250Ω Beyers. Adding the Integration bought that back to nearer 12o'clock on the volume knob, so a noticeable increase in gain.

 

[tjessen]

I do not have the budget required to order the integration at the moment, so would the re-wire provide enough gain? Also what are some recommendations on 6922s?

 

[tjessen]

Also, I still wish to use my Crack with my DAC, and i listen within 90 degrees of silent. Will I get enough control in my volume with the 6922?

 

[Paul Birkeland]

Also, I still wish to use my Crack with my DAC, and i listen within 90 degrees of silent. Will I get enough control in my volume with the 6922?

I've built a Crack a long, long time ago using a 6922.  The gain was overwhelming with any modern source components I had.

The Speedball and Integration will give you some additional headroom. 

-PB

 

[tjessen]

I've got the speedball, I may consider a preamp in my system. Any suggestions? I'm thinking of straying away from tubes though :/

 

[Paul Joppa]

The 6922 mod is not complicated; just wire the heater power to pins 4 and 5 instead of 4/5 and 9 for the 12AU7. The other pins (1,2,3,6,7,8) remain the same. Leave pin 9 floating. Once done, the 6AU7 is a drop-in replacement for the 6922, if you want to compare over the long term.

However, the 6922 has a greater need for caution about oscillation; I would use grid and plate stoppers as in the Reduction - of course I AM a very cautious engineer! It will make about as much difference as Integration and Speedball combined, at the cost of an inch or two of solder plus a 6922 or 6DJ8. If you try it, use any old 6922 or 6DJ8 available cheap; if you then like it you can explore better tubes for the fun of it. I did tell you it's a can of worms, didn't I?

The mismatch of analog and digital loudness is a very frustrating problem, which has come up now and then ever since the original Seduction 12 years ago. In theory, and with well-recorded music as documented in the professional audio literature, and compared to digital sources that follow the Redbook standards, Reduction should make about the same loudness level as digital sources. Far too often this does not seem to be the case, and I do not have enough data available to me to determine why. Here is a short list of the three most plausible explanations:

1. The phonograph recording is made at a substantially lower "maximum VU" level than the standard 5cm/sec velocity

2. The digital full-scale (FS) output exceeds the Redbook standard of 2.0 volts RMS

3. The digital recording is more aggressively compressed than the phonograph recording

There is a lot of ranting on the web about excessively compressed digital audio, but I've never seen a good statistical analysis to quantify the problem so I can't say if that's the main issue or not. As I said, very frustrating for an engineer!

 

[fullheadofnothing]

However, normally listening volume with my reduction plugged into my Crack has me turning the potentiometer to max. Is this normal?

The position of the volume knob really doesn't matter. When you turn it up all the way, is that below the volume you would like to listen at? If so, then there's a problem to address. If not, just listen and move on. Also you never said if you had tried different records. Since you've had it running for less than a day, it's unlikely that you've spent many hours listening to a variety of music.

Have you used your current cartridge setup with other phono preamps? Have you used your Reduction in any other systems besides the Crack? It's possible that your Reduction still has an issue. One way of testing would be to download a 60Hz tone, adjust your computer's output to be exactly 5mV, then feed it into the Reduction and measure the output with your meter set to VAC. That could tell if something is still amiss.

Furthermore, you've never said what headphones you are using. Is this possibly a non-ideal situation?

 

[tjessen]

I've compared Reduction to another phono preamp and it delivers a similar gain. I've spent about 6 hours now with my Reduction and many different recordings and for the most time the volume delivered is sufficient, I just wish for a little more on certain recordings or as my listening session progresses. I'm running a pair of hd650s and a Tung Sol 5998 which seemed to raise the gain. I've also used it with my speakers, and it achieves similar loudness to my other phono pre (40/42ish db gain). It seems up to industry standards, I just want more loudness in my system.

 

[Doc B]

If you just want a little more volume the Integration would probably be the best solution. You could also try a 5998 in place of the 6080 in the Crack, as it has a smaller magnitude negative gain (meaning it makes the Crack a little more sensitive)

 

[tjessen]

I'm building a preamp to use in my speaker system and will see how it performs with my vinyl rig and Crack. Right now the noise coming from the Crack is quite audible when listening to lps so I'm hoping the preamp will work well in the system. Thanks for all of the suggestions! I hope you Canadians had a wonderful Thanksgiving.

 

[crackaddict]

Hi all,

I'm jumping onto this thread as I was just about to start up a similar one. I finished my Reduction (Integration upgrade built but installation pending a first listen without, per forum advice a few months ago) and finally received my Pro-Ject 2Xperience Classic with Sumico Blue Point No. 2 High Output MC cartridge. This is my first turntable in 20 years, so I have no other point of reference.

For several months, my setup has been Sonos -> Arcam rDAC -> Steremour -> Orcas + Dungeness. Now I swapped the input to Pro-Ject/Sumico -> Reduction -> Steremour. My immediate reaction was the same: way too quiet. I used to listen to the Steremour at about 12:00 when sitting at my desk (1m from the Orcas). I could listen to it at 100% without any earbleed, but that really was too LOUD.

Now, with the Reduction, I am listening at 90%-100%. With many records, even 100% leaves me looking for more volume. This is based on a sample of about 20 rock LPs from the '60s and '70s, and a few remastered jazz LPs. For example, the remastered 180gm Sketches of Spain is FAR too quiet to enjoy, as is an original 1971 pressing of Led Zeppelin III (which was still sealed until yesterday!).

I will try the Integration upgrade immediately, but I'm also wondering if there is another unit I can add to the signal chain to get more output?

Also, I'm thinking I just need to build a second system, i.e. keep the Steremour and Orcas in my smaller study, and build a set of Paramours for 5" Mako standmounts in my large living room, for use with the turntable. I'm wondering if the 9W output and slightly more sensitive speakers will be substantially different?

Any ideas are much appreciated.

Thanks,
Derek

 

[Doc B]

You really need to put the Integration in before you can make a determination because it will increase the output. The 2.5mV Sumiko output is right at low end of what we recommend using with the Reduction. If the Integration doesn't get you up to where you feel the level needs to be, a Quickie added after the Reduction will boost the signal level a bit more.

 

[crackaddict]

Super. Will look into the quickie and will consider whether there's an easy-ish upgrade path (swap) for my cartridge.

Thanks,
Derek

 

[tjessen]

You're situation is flawlessly exact of mine Derek. Let us know how any solution you decide upon performs, I'm considering a preamp.

 

[crackaddict]

I'm heading out today to swap out the cartridge. I figure it's the first place to start, getting something that puts out 5mV. Then I'll add the Integration upgrade. I'll let you know what cartridge I end up with and how it works out.

 

[Paul Birkeland]

I think that's a wise decision. 

-PB

 

[crackaddict]

So, today I had the hi-fi shop swap my cartridge for an Ortofon 2M Blue (I got some cash back out of the deal!). That definitely helped. For about the same volume that used to be maxed out, the new cartridge had me at about 3:00. Then I installed the Integration upgrade, which dropped the volume knob another "hour," i.e. perhaps to 2:00 for the same volume.

So the good news is I'm getting some definite volume out of this setup now! With an original pressing of Van Halen's Diver Down, sitting in the same near-field location as before, I don't need to turn it past 12:00. And putting it through my Crack, going past 12:00 got to be too much.

When I lift the needle off the record, however, a hum becomes quite apparent. I have easily isolated this to the Reduction. Troubleshooting that is likely for another thread...

Now I just need to figure out if I like this cartridge or not. It's my first turntable since I got my first CD player in 1987, so I don't have a lot to compare it to. But overall, I'm very glad im getting back into vinyl.

Derek