Hi, I'm an original owner of one of Frank's Vision phono stages based on the old Burr-Brown opamps. Lots of components have been upgraded since I first purchased it, and now it's time to tackle what I imagine is my weakest link.
It's being fed a .3mv signal from a Phasemation PP-500 I bought a few months ago. It supplies one of Steve Deckert's 341.5 Zen Triodes, which I suspect is still being starved a bit even with the Vision set at the max unpublished gain setting, which I *think* is 70db. Well, the s/n explains why it's unpublished, but dropping to 66dB sucks the life out of the amp, so at the moment I'm just livin' with it. I've set the Vision loading to just shy of 40 ohm, which seems to be about right for this cartridge.
Seems Frank's evolved the Vision at least twice since my old model shipped, and I'm confident what he's just released blows it away, but I have a feeling the optimal solution for me is to get a preamp with the new VisionQ+ card, so long as (1) I've still got all the loading options as the stand-alone phono stage; (2) the preamp gain is going to more than offset dropping the card's gain down to at least 66dB.
So perhaps I've partially answered my own question, but even so, Frank's got four preamps to choose from and I'm at a loss as to which one is going to give me the most gain, be the best match for my tube amp, so any insight would certainly be appreciated - Jim Neal
Thorens TD124/II with major mods
Jelco TK-850L
Phasemation PP-500
Audio By Van Alstine Vision Phono (pre-2017)
Decware 341.5
ZU Audio Omen IIs (dirty weekend with all upgrades)
