Low quality of my cartridge+preamp—can you suggest others? ≤€500 Options

[dumdidum]

I currently digitize vinyl working with a technics 1210, an audio-technica at-95e, and the preamps built into my native instruments traktor kontrol s4. presumably, few people here will know what an s4 is. for purposes of this thread, it should be sufficient to note that the s4 is a midi controller (roughly speaking--actually, it uses a different protocol) which includes a 4-in, 4-out audio interface with 2 phono preamps that's geared towards DJs. the audio interface in the s4 might be comparable to standalone 4-in, 4-out USB 2.0 audio interface with 2 phono preamps in the $200 range (again, it would be an audio interface geared towards DJs so it would come with very low-latency asio drivers).

i am unsatisfied with the results i'm currently getting. i record with audacity at default settings (32-bit floating point, 44.1kHz). the gain in windows' volume mixer for the channel to which the 1210 is connected to is at 100%. the peak levels i'm getting during recording are at about -12dB to -15dB. (there's no way in audacity to further boost the volume during recording.) i don't perceive the audio quality as good at all despite the fact that i'm digitizing records in mint condition. (i'm trying to digitize vinyl-only releases so buying digital is not an option. unfortunately, in the genres i listen to--certain areas of house and techno--, vinyl-only release are relatively common.) on some recordings, the kick drum sounds muffled. on most recordings, i feel noise levels are excessive.

now, i certainly don't think the preamps in my audio interface are any good. the at-95e cartridge which i recently bought for EUR 20 is entry-level, too. does anyone have suggestions as to what preamp and cartridge to buy? as for my budget: EUR 500 (~$650) is my absolute max. ideally, i'd like to spend less. so i'd be happier if i can get something reasonable for, say, EUR 300 or so.

This post has been edited by dumdidum: Feb 15 2012, 01:01

[2Bdecided]

I'm amazed that two supposedly working RIAA pre-amps can sound so different. The EQ is completely different, and different in different ways on each channel.

IMO that's either abysmal design or a hardware fault.

Whether the 640p+s4 combination is "correct" or not is difficult to say without a known recording. I think it's fair to conclude that the s4 on its own is wrong though.

Maybe cliveb would have a more generous explanation, related to cable lengths, capacitance, etc - but I've never heard anything quite that bad.

Cheers,
David.

This post has been edited by 2Bdecided: Mar 7 2012, 12:09

[cliveb]

Maybe cliveb would have a more generous explanation, related to cable lengths, capacitance, etc - but I've never heard anything quite that bad.

Since I'm unfamiliar with music of this style, I can't really comment on whether the tonal balance of these recordings is typical. They certainly sound kind of "thick" to me. The S4 clip in particular seems very lacking in top-end, especially on the left channel.

The loading of moving magnet cartridges can have a large effect on treble response. If the phono preamp's capacitance is too high, or its input impedance too low, then you can lose quite a lot of high frequencies. I checked out the specs of the S4 and it claims an input impedance of 47k, which is the standard for MM cartridges, so if anything is wrong it's likely to be a high input capacitance. The fact that the two channels are strikingly different would tend to suggest that QA on the S4 may not be up to snuff - so maybe the input impedance is out. This difference can't be in the LP itself, because the 640p recording doesn't have this imbalance.