Graham Slee - Reflex C - MC Phono Preamp

Faster - For Winning Results

You buy a moving coil cartridge for high-performance — so team it with a performance phono preamp for winning results!

The music you listen to should be your choice — your equipment shouldn't dictate your musical taste.

That's the trap many fall into when "upgrading" to moving coil. If in doing so, you find it difficult to listen to your kind of music, read on, and find out why you need this high performance phono preamp.

The Reflex C is supplied with the PSU1 power supply, and a choice of voltages and power plugs; 100 Ω or 1k Ω input impedances; and there is also an option to have a mono switch fitted.

Moving Coil Primer...

Moving coil cartridges output somewhere in the region of 0.1 - 1 mV - they're low output.

The idea behind the moving coil cartridge is great! By making the magnets fixed to the body, the stylus moves the coils of wire instead. The coils of wire are made really light by using only a small number of turns, which means there's much less inductance compared to moving magnet cartridges.

This results in a nimble cartridge whose frequency response goes much higher, and without the inductive peaking you get with moving magnet.

But everything has its downside, and with moving coil it's the phono preamp electronics that haven't kept pace with the progress the moving coil cartridge made.

Overcoming The Physical Difficulties of Phono Preamps

The output of a moving coil cartridge is so low that ultra-low noise electronics are needed to amplify it.

Ultra-low noise means the input stage has to be restricted in its "latitude" and so the input easily saturates on loud passages and record noise (clicks and pops).

Loud and "busy" musical passages become harshly distorted - even if the specifications declare the opposite - audio analysers can only measure steady state.

Inputs which easily saturate also have poor slew-rate - the "processing speed" is slow and leading edges of the music signal are curtailed - it's called slew-induced distortion.

The Reflex C Gives You The Freedom To Choose

The Reflex C uses low-noise video amplifiers which overcome the difficulties of input saturation and slew induced distortion.

You can play the music you want! Throw the fastest tempo music at the Reflex C and you'll marvel at its pace.

It captures all the subtleties of your music - all its detail - plus it projects a really convincing and articulate stereo image - and much less in the way of clicks and pops.

The Reflex C is the answer to moving coil preamplification you've been waiting for.

Suitable Cartridges

The Reflex C is suited to low output moving coil (MC) with output in the region of 0.2 - 1.0 mV (ref 1kHz at 5cm/sec)

Cartridges having lower outputs may be used if you accept the risk of hearing more hiss than you may be comfortable with.

Your amplifier's volume control is intended to be set to give you the loudness you want and should be adjusted accordingly. With the lowest output cartridges you will need to turn the volume control higher than you would use with other sources such as a CD player.

Recording while you listen

The variable output can also be used to feed a digital recorder (or even a tape recorder!) whilst you listen to the record via the fixed output into your line preamp, integrated amplifier or receiver. Use the volume control to set the right input level into your recording device. Quite often a fixed output level is too "hot" for a digital recorder's analogue input and results in hard clipping. Turn the volume control down so you get just the right recording level.

The very best of EMC protection

The shielding provided on the Accession MC safeguards against the intrusion of unwanted electro-magnetic disturbances, which at best would colour the sound and at worst you'd hear interference from other devices. Make sure you use properly shielded interconnects with it so interference hasn't a chance. Our range of interconnects will help you achieve additional immunity.

Unobtrusive compact design

Our eurocard 1U height cases save on space so you can have more things to enjoy without the worry of where to put them. They will stack on top of each other and will even work on their sides. They're remotely powered so won't make other sensitive items hum or buzz.

Remotely powered

The Accession MC uses (and is supplied with) our PSU1 power supply which should be placed off-rack, keeping transformer influences away from your sensitive equipment, and most importantly well away from your pick-up cartridge. Remote DC power is the most sensible way to power sensitive equipment. There is no transformer inside your Accession MC to worry about, and no AC on its low voltage cord to induce hum into adjacent cables.

Full details on our unique EQ system can be found here, and you can read about the background and electronic principles here.