Manley SteelHead owners at AA ?
 

Hi Folks,

Do we have owners of this wonderful phono preamp here ?
I read many reviews of it, from Tone Audio and others, and it looks to be a very special one, with a large, big, warm sound.
At 7500 US $, considering all its features, it is a very attractive phono preamp in my opinion.

Cheers,

Jerome.......I own the Steelhead its one of my favorites :yes:

http://www.manleylabs.com/images/BIG...elheadver2.jpg


http://www.manleylabs.com/images/BIG...adver2rear.jpg

While I don't own one, I did live with it for about six months...
Really great, especially if you have more than one turntable! Easily adjustable from the front panel.

If you don't need the remote option, there is the occasional used "older model" around. Not bad either.

EveAnna makes great stuff. I think you will enjoy it, if you'd like that "slightly romantic" sound.

:drool:

Would be fun, I'm currently using a Project Tube Box II.

:yes: I have a Manley Stingray integrated amp...very happy with the build and performance.

Jeff, thanks for your answer.
At this price, 7500 $, what are the other phono stages I should listen to ?

The Nagra VPS, about $7500. Not as many inputs, tougher to set loading, but smaller, cleaner design, more of a "modern" tube sound compared to the steelhead.

The AVID Pulsare, $5000. Solid state, but excellent quality, very neutral, killer bass big dynamics, super quiet.

ARC Ph7, I think about $6000

CJ TEA2 SE, about 5000 again a bit on the warm side but very good.

Of course Ivan will tell you to check out the Aesthetix Rhea.


Personally, I'd have a tough time between the Nagra and the Manley...
With the AVID a close second.

Personally, when I listened to the Steelhead, warm and tubey were not my views of it.

It was far more neutral and more like SS IMO. maybe I never ran it in.

At the time my then Pass Xono was warmer

Thanks friends ! highly appreciated !
Jeff, do you plan to test the Linn Uphorik ?
much cheaper and SS but it received many impressive comments in Europe....
Cheers,

Jerome

The Nagra VPS is a great phono amp. Setting loading does require you to unscrew the lid and use some tweezers to plug in the loading cards but this not too hard once you get the hang of it. It certainly does not lend itself however to fiddling with values like the Rhea or ref 2 Phonos will allow.

Tha Avid has me intrigued though somewhat.

Howie

Jerome...are you making any headway on your phono preamp research/auditions? Curious if you have narrowed down the field at all.

Hi Cyril,

I am supposed to borrow the Linn Uphorik today. I will have it until next monday.
But Paris is under the snow and the trafic could be very difficult.
We'll see if I can get there....
Cheers

Jérôme.......I imagine Paris is beautiful when it snows.

:yes: Dan !

But trafic Jam is awful : we are getting more and more snow these last years, and colder winters. Paris will have to make some investments to accommodate this change. But the accounts are empty....

Global warming....

I recently befriended a Steelhead and had them connected to a pair of Krell KMA 160 amps.
Too bad I don't own a turntable, because when I was playing CDs through it... Heaven!
I paid half of new though, so that was sweet.... But..... The set is too big and may have to downsize...

Sound wise, with the Krells, it was like I was hugged by a blanket of beautiful sound....

I would love to have one of these.

I wonder how the Steelhead sounds compared to the 300B Neo Classic for a line input....:scratch2:

I had a Steelhead in my system for a long time. The stock tubes (Sovteks, if memory serves, for the 6922/6d8j) do it no favors in my book. I rolled a lot of tubes in it. I also experimented with the step-ups and the MM inputs and wound up preferring the MM inputs, both on a Lyra Titan i and later on the Airtight PC-1. I also preferred using it with an additional line stage (over most of its life, a Lamm L2) which gave it additional weight and palpability- it sounded more fleshed out. No doubt the bass, particularly with the Titan i, was spectacular and the highs very illuminated, but in my system, it sounded more 'hi fi' straight in. It might have to do with how the volume control and associated circuitry were implemented; to my ears, it sounded better bypassing all that, running it from the fixed, rather than variable outputs into a separate line stage and controlling the volume there.The unit was extremely well made, pretty easy to change out tubes, and support from Manley was second to none.

Wasatch, you can if you want to...

Hello,

I've compared Manley Steelhead and Aesthetix IO with two PS in one system.
Manley gives more smoth sound but IO plays much deeper at LF. So it depends.
And IO plays with a strong focus on middle.

In any case Steelhead is much better than Rhea and IO with single PS.

Regards from Russia

Djubei, welcome! :wave:

I like to have a SteelHead some day.

As for me Steelhead is one of the best in category up to 15000$.
So I sold my Aesthetix Janus with 12 tubes on the board and bought Steelhead. But I want to roll Sovtek's. They are better than EH, but they does not sound as the tubes should be.

Thank you:thumbsup:

I don't think that the musicality would be close to the 300B line preamp. The design of the 300B is much more purist.
I think that you would get a better end with the 300B and the Chinook than with the Steelhead.
But of course, I may be completely wrong. That is just my personal feeling and is not based on A / B listening since I never heard the Steelhead.

As I understand Chinook is an addition to Jumbo Shrimp

I thought about that combo also, the 300B has a headphone jack, where the Steelhead does not.

And what a headphone jack Oh My ! :thumbsup::thumbsup::thumbsup:

Straight from EveAnna Manley, the Chinook shares A LOT of circuit design with the Steelhead, but does not have three inputs or linestage capability. If you only need one input and are on a tighter budget, the Chinook is fantastic.

The real trick with the Aesthetix phono stages is to find a great set of NOS or EAT tubes. That increases the performance substantially over stock.

First post
Own the Steelhead paired with Snappers for some time, Vinyl sounded superb, but CD at line input lagged somewhat behind.. then I found out that the Steelhead does not offer any gain at line input. So..
I started wondering / thinking that the NC300B would surely help the gain issue..

So, I bought the NC300B preamp unseen, unheard, but I was confident, although I had reservations about adding loads of parts in the signal path yet again, never mind the extra interconnect and powercord..

The NC300B linestage was the best decision made.
This goes even further, i dare to claim that any Steelhead or as a matter any Manley Snapper or NC250 owner has never heard those without the NC300B.
Most of time we see Steelhead owners selling it eventually, the same accounts for poweramps.

So, strongly suggest going full Manley.
Just order the NC300B and experience the same. Guaranteed next level.
I do not experience them as beeing warm, tubey or full sounding.

Manleyfied.

Me too!!!

I've got a Steelhead on order. I've a question to all you Steelhead owners. I read this in a owners feedback " I can select w/out having to patch cables. Running the fixed outputs to the line in & sending the vari outs to the amp is the most transparent option."
Sorry if I'm a bit mystified by this, hows it done without cable patching. How are the switches on the Steelhead set to do this?

Hey Steelhead Guru's out there, Ok I'll put it another way. On the Steelhead can you use a pair of patch cables & connect the fixed outputs to the line in (which supposedly/hopefully gets better performance using the variable output) ?

The Steelhead has no gain at line section, so doing that you only insert another interconnect loop. If you really want to hear what the Steelhead is capable (at Line and Phono) insert the NC300B ! :thumbsup:

Thanks 4RE, I'd asked EveAnna and she said the same. After just buying the Steelhead and NC250's I'll have to wait a while before adding any more kit but thanks for the tip, that certainly looks like the way to go.

Anyone roll a quad of Tung-sol 5687 ladder plates into Steelhead, what is the end result?

Ed

I completely agree
when me insert NC300B after steelhead - sound has become more full