so recently I got my first “real” turntable - a Rega P3 Anniversary edition used in mint condition for a good price. The anniversary edition includes the Rega Exact MM cartridge the RB330 tonearm and the PSU. I got the Rega Fono MM mk5 in addition as phono preamp.
When connected to my speaker setup it sounds fabulous! The chain is: P3 → Fono MM mk5 → nubert ampx → Monitor Audio Silver 50.
After a few days I connected the Fono MM mk5 to the ifi zen amp. And … was confronted with a total channel imbalance. The right side was significantly louder than the left one. So much that I couldn’t listen to it.
Tried to switch headphones, cables - same result. Swapping the channels left - right also swapped the imbalance. Checked the ifi amp with playback from a different source - everything works fine.
Then tried the xduoo xd05 pro instead of the ifi amp. The left channel wasnt just muted compared to the right, it was entirely silent. Tried with different cables, same result. Connected the xduoo to a different dac using the same connections (line in) - everything works fine.
Listening via the speaker setup I cant hear any imbalance though. I’m very confused as the signal from the Fono mk5 is a line signal that should be stable for any amp to work with?
Now I ordered a passive channel volume control to mitigate imbalance. I turned down the right channel so that the sound is balanced for the headphones. Then connected to the nubert ampx - the right speaker is entirely silent.
I’m very confused as I don’t understand what is happening here. Asking ChatGPT it suggests that the issue might be with the cartridge or the tonearm. Which I kinda doubt but I’m also not a expert in any way.
Does anyone have an explanation or similar experiences with headphones and turntables?
oh nevermind … I just tried with the topping L50 as headphone amp instead of the ifi … and it works flawlessly. It seems the issue lies with the ifi amp.
Wonder if there’s a loose connection somewhere on or inside the ifi? Might be either a bad solder joint OR if there’s a pin connection, maybe it’s losing solid contact from time to time.
hard to say, but there is definitely something wrong with the ifi … if I connect only one input, I can still hear the music when i cycle through the other inputs, even though nothing is connected on those.
Hmm…is it designed to have some kind of passthrough? I’ve had gear like the Earman ST-amp which has no isolation between outputs, so if you plug in headphones but still have the preamp outputs connected they both output at the gain of the volume’s potentiometer (which I worked around at the time by using an external switcher to basically “dead head” the output when I didn’t want to push my speakers).
fun fact: the ifi just literally went to smokes - wanted to do some more testing and suddenly something popped then smoke came out of the power socket of the ifi. I guess this case is closed.
Damn! Was it new/within warranty, or a used set? Sounds like something they ought to cover and, if not, I guess “magic smoke” is all she wrote, as you said.
I just looked it up - I bought it new in 2021. So we are well past the 2 years warranty period. But I have to admit - I’m in my mid 40s and I haven’t seen a lot of my devices went up in smokes like that.
Yeaaaah, Magic Smoke is never normal and usually means something either was touching the wrong thing or a part of the system was bypassed which let voltage or amperage run away…you may want to reach out to them anyway since that’s a parts issue which is outside the scope of normal build/operation. No guarantee that they’ll honor anything, but you never know!
Yeah and the cross talk between the input channels also kinda indicated that something was “wired incorrectly”.
Anyway for today I can go to bed and rest assured that I found the problem that plagued me. And tbh I’m happy that it’s the ifi as this is the cheapest link of the whole chain.
