Sutherland Club House

uvwxVinyl said:
I get to join this club for a bit! An amazing coworker heard I was interested in Sutherland and coincidentally had a ph3d sitting in his basement that he no longer uses since his upgrade to a tube pre amp.

He wanted to sell it but no one really knows about Sutherland here so it's just been sitting around and I can keep it for as long as I want to explore the sound and see if I want to pick up a KC vibe eventually. Really awesome since I've read a lot but it's very difficult to find these here to see what they sound like.

Does anyone know about the ph3d. I assume it's a legacy product but it probably still sounds good.
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Personally, I'm not sure I would trade a PH3D for a KC Vibe. The original US price on the PH3D was $1,000. If you like it, see how much he wants for it. He's obviously not in need of max cash right away, and has already had trouble selling it. You can probably get it for a good deal!

Look closely at the board layout. The Insight appears to be a PH3D with a linear power supply. There are a few differences, but in general the board is laid out with what appears to be many of the same parts in the same places through the actual phono section. The KC Vibe has a much more simplistic layout. I could be totally wrong (not an engineer) but I would expect the PH3D to be pretty close to the Insight in sound.

KC Vibe
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PH3D and Insight
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displayname said:
Personally, I'm not sure I would trade a PH3D for a KC Vibe. The original US price on the PH3D was $1,000. If you like it, see how much he wants for it. He's obviously not in need of max cash right away, and has already had trouble selling it. You can probably get it for a good deal!

Look closely at the board layout. The Insight appears to be a PH3D with a linear power supply. There are a few differences, but in general the board is laid out with what appears to be many of the same parts in the same places through the actual phono section. The KC Vibe has a much more simplistic layout. I could be totally wrong (not an engineer) but I would expect the PH3D to be pretty close to the Insight in sound.

KC Vibe
View attachment 22275

PH3D and Insight
View attachment 22276
View attachment 22277
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I think @displayname is on to something there with the PH3D/Insight comparison. That being said and having owned both the Vibe and now the Insight, go with the PH3D, huge jump from the Vibe. Just to give the Vibe some due props though, It would be a nice upgrade on a budget to the Pho8 or iPhono2 ;)
 
Yep the ph3d is battery powered but he's saying it ould be a really long time before you have to change them out. He certainly hadn't in his time of use and the light on the front still let up when we powered it up last night. He said the light would blink/flicker once it was time to change them.

I'll post some pics once I have the time to hook it up and listen in a week or so.
 
displayname said:
Personally, I'm not sure I would trade a PH3D for a KC Vibe. The original US price on the PH3D was $1,000. If you like it, see how much he wants for it. He's obviously not in need of max cash right away, and has already had trouble selling it. You can probably get it for a good deal!

Look closely at the board layout. The Insight appears to be a PH3D with a linear power supply. There are a few differences, but in general the board is laid out with what appears to be many of the same parts in the same places through the actual phono section. The KC Vibe has a much more simplistic layout. I could be totally wrong (not an engineer) but I would expect the PH3D to be pretty close to the Insight in sound.

KC Vibe
View attachment 22275

PH3D and Insight
View attachment 22276
View attachment 22277
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Good observation! That PH3D must weigh a ton with all those D cells inserted! Lol
 
uvwxVinyl said:
Hoping I can get to that this weekend!

p.s. can someone recommend what jumper settings I should be using? I have an Ortofon 20M.
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Loading will be 47K. I would start on 40db or 45db for the gain. My gut tells me 40 is going to be best, but it doesn't hurt to try both and let your ears decide.

Edit, here's a nice little tool and chart: KAB PHONO PREAMP PARAMETER COMPUTER
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kvetcha said:
I gather you should generally use the lowest phono gain you can get away with.
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Notice HiFi's quote below. That's the important thing:
HiFi Guy said:
I wouldn't take this as gospel.
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I think it's key to not take any of this as gospel. It's all guidelines. I'm not an engineer by any means, but I think it's best to always remember that each setting is part of a system - and you are trying to tune that system. You can spend all day worrying about the numbers, running calculators, etc.
But here's the reality - we can't control all the variables and it's hard to know each one without specific measurements. Sure, a cart is spec'd to run at 4mV output. Well what if the manufacturer's tolerance for that measurement defines anything from 3.8 - 4.2 as acceptable? And what if your amp has a higher or lower input sensitivity? And what if those are slightly out of spec? What if the tools used by the companies to measure was only within the edge of it's tolerance? How does that effect a record that's cut a little hot, or cut too quiet? Is your head spinning yet?

Sure you could spend time looking all those specs up, and even take it a step further and measure it for the actual components you have.
Or you could just listen to a track or two on both settings within the range and go with the one your prefer the sound of. If you find it seems a little off over time, just try the other one and see if that fixes it. You don't really run a risk of breaking anything if you're in the ball park. It's when you set things way out of line that you might run a slight risk of an issue.
 
The Ph3D is up an running after a slightly frustrating morning...the damn dimensions are exactly 0.5cm wider than my Pioneer rack so I couldn't slide it in (my coworker will definitely make a point about 'American Engineering' when I tell him this :) ), as a result it now has to sit on the top of the rack and my turntable sits on top of it. Quite ghetto, anyway I guess this is just temporary.

Secondly my daughter is having her nap so I could only run it through my speakers for a few seconds then switched to my headphone amp after which I had a really loud buzz in my phones. In the end realized I needed to hook up the turntable ground to the sutherland rather than the receiver that it was previously hooked up to. Good to know!

I'm listening to the last record I had on the table. Chick Corea's Return To Forever. It sounds better than the last time I heard the record for sure, I can't pinpoint just what exactly. It's much louder as I had to turn down the volume a fair bit, and there are details that. I'm hearing that weren't there before. The precussion and bass sounds lovely on this album. Again I think first impressions are great but I really need to do an A/B comparison with speakers and study the differences a bit more carefully.
 
uvwxVinyl said:
The Ph3D is up an running after a slightly frustrating morning...the damn dimensions are exactly 0.5cm wider than my Pioneer rack so I couldn't slide it in (my coworker will definitely make a point about 'American Engineering' when I tell him this :) ), as a result it now has to sit on the top of the rack and my turntable sits on top of it. Quite ghetto, anyway I guess this is just temporary.

Secondly my daughter is having her nap so I could only run it through my speakers for a few seconds then switched to my headphone amp after which I had a really loud buzz in my phones. In the end realized I needed to hook up the turntable ground to the sutherland rather than the receiver that it was previously hooked up to. Good to know!

I'm listening to the last record I had on the table. Chick Corea's Return To Forever. It sounds better than the last time I heard the record for sure, I can't pinpoint just what exactly. It's much louder as I had to turn down the volume a fair bit, and there are details that. I'm hearing that weren't there before. The precussion and bass sounds lovely on this album. Again I think first impressions are great but I really need to do an A/B comparison with speakers and study the differences a bit more carefully.
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The initial "WOW" factor is always fun with equipment, but over time you'll be spinning albums you feel you're really comfortable with and you'll start to hear those things that were missing before. When that becomes the norm you'll realize what a difference it really is making. Enjoy :)
 
MgwmTf.gif


Feel like this pretty much summarizes my listening experience today. This is from someone who has never had a separate phono pre amp. What I'm curious to know is what a much more basic pre amp sounds like in comparison - probably not much different than the one I already have inside my receiver I guess.

As a side note, I might ask the guy if I can buy this off him. What do you think is a fair price? My real concern here is the environmental impact of all these batteries :/
 
uvwxVinyl said:
MgwmTf.gif


Feel like this pretty much summarizes my listening experience today. This is from someone who has never had a separate phono pre amp. What I'm curious to know is what a much more basic pre amp sounds like in comparison - probably not much different than the one I already have inside my receiver I guess.

As a side note, I might ask the guy if I can buy this off him. What do you think is a fair price? My real concern here is the environmental impact of all these batteries :/
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Ask him what he wants for it. You might be surprised. I'd think $400 is fair given the age of the unit.
 
Officially a member of the clubhouse as of today. I had been stalking the insight on Music Direct for a long time waiting for a demo unit to pop, one finally did, and I scooped it up. Fedex dropped it off two hours ago and wow this is amazing. I had been running a Lounge LCR MK III for the last three years which I absolutely loved but was ready for the upgrade I didn't think it would be this dramatic. I think I just listened to Sgt. Peppers for the first time all over again. No need for the 60 day window it's staying.
 
bjshawk1980 said:
Officially a member of the clubhouse as of today. I had been stalking the insight on Music Direct for a long time waiting for a demo unit to pop, one finally did, and I scooped it up. Fedex dropped it off two hours ago and wow this is amazing. I had been running a Lounge LCR MK III for the last three years which I absolutely loved but was ready for the upgrade I didn't think it would be this dramatic. I think I just listened to Sgt. Peppers for the first time all over again. No need for the 60 day window it's staying.
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I'm familiar with the Lounge. The Insight is an entirely different league.
 
bjshawk1980 said:
Officially a member of the clubhouse as of today. I had been stalking the insight on Music Direct for a long time waiting for a demo unit to pop, one finally did, and I scooped it up. Fedex dropped it off two hours ago and wow this is amazing. I had been running a Lounge LCR MK III for the last three years which I absolutely loved but was ready for the upgrade I didn't think it would be this dramatic. I think I just listened to Sgt. Peppers for the first time all over again. No need for the 60 day window it's staying.
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Welcome aboard! I'm sure you'll only grow to love it more and more as time goes on.
 
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