[Denverhifi]

This is a problem I noticed just a couple of days ago. I may have had it for awhile, but never noticed. Here’s why I never noticed. After plugging in my new Kece phono preamp a couple of weeks ago, I turned off the mute to listen to the speakers without anything playing. Much to my surprise I heard some static. Not steady, only intermittent, and without any kind of regular pattern.  I never noticed this before, because if there is no music playing, the mute is on.  This may have been going on with my previous phono preamp. It’s only happening with my turntable, not with my CD player. I’ve been doing a lot of switching of cables, moving inputs, and just generally checking everything. No luck.  I definitely need some help with this one.

[FullRangeMan]

Guess dust in any connection.

[Mag]

No expert but recently hooked up my TT. Heat ducting pipe worked for getting a good ground and the hum was gone.

[Mag]

Learning about the history of electricity this is my take, someone with better knowledge can correct where I'm wrong.

In the early 1800's it was discovered that you can send a electromagnetic signal down a wire at great distances instantly (speed of light) thus the telegraph was born. A telegraph machine works something like a cartridge in a turntable, with a magnet and electricity. Electromagnetic is a fundamental property of electricity not understood by everyone, people just knew it worked and wanted to find ways to profit from what it could do, like electrical motors.

Around 1858 an under sea cable was connected between North America as England. The signal worked but Morse code messages became badly distorted taking many hours to decode. The problem was nobody understood that electromagnetic sent down a wire travels in pulses. So when this was understood the problem was fixed. May have been where pulse code modulation (pcm) came from and is used in telephones, turntable cartridges, cd digital playback applications.

So why grounding? Electromagnetic electricity works something like lightning. If your in a car and get struck by lighting. The current will pass around the car frame and travel to the ground. Now if you were standing outside the car with your hand touching the car the current would travel through you like the car frame and zap you.

I imagine grounding a TT work similar to lightning on a smaller scale. By grounding the electromagnetic pulse travels around all the stereo equipment safely to the ground. Without the ground you get static build up in electrical equipment, which is the hum or intermittent noise produced by the TT cartridge.

[Letitroll98]

Did you check the tonearm cables at the cartridge, which is where you most likely have a loose connection or broken wire, then back to the RCA outputs, be they captive cable or jacks on the table.  These tiny, delicate wires are the most likely culprit for noise of all types.  If you did check them, do it again, took me three times to find the loose connection, but then I'm an idiot, or at least thought so when I finally found it.  Second, do you use shielded cable from the table?  Might be RFI from a local radio tower or an appliance in your house cycling on and off, think refrigerator or AC unit.  The only shielded cable I had around the house was a pair of Monster Cable 550i, wasn't the issue, but found they sound really nice, pleasant surprise.

[Denverhifi]

Since I discovered this buzz a couple of days ago, I have been doing a lot of listening to my phono section-without any music playing.  As you can imagine, it has been driving me crazy!
I am sitting here in silence, longer than I have for a couple of days-and it’s great.
After reading your suggestions, I continued to be suspicious of my tonearm. After checking the connections again at the tonearm, I thought the problem may be that I had pushed the connectors on too far, causing them to open. Nope!
My Rega tonearm has a Incognito wiring harness. The ground wire has a alligator clip. What if I cut off the clip, and stripped the wire? BUZZ GONE!
This tonearm came on my George Warren turntable six years ago. Is the buzz new with my New Keces phono preamp, or has it been part of my system since I got it!  Impossible to know, but I will now be checking for the buzz from time to time.
Thanks for the help.