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Benz Micro of Switzerland Phono Cartridges

Albert Lukaschek’s phono cartridge designs are among the very best in the world.  Solid, holographic soundstages, proper tonality, and a realistic overall musical presentation are all hallmarks of his designs.   Whether you seek a good-sounding budget cartridge with a usefully high output or a state-of-the-art low output design, Benz Micro has a high-value option for you.

Email us at info@audiointelligent.com or call us at 573-696-3551 for information about Benz Micro or to place an order.

The Benz Micro S Class phono cartridges offer a new, improved level of high fidelity performance.

Benz Micro has raised the performance bar with their S Class of phono cartridges. Led by flagship LP S cartridge model and the SLR Gullwing model, the entire Benz Micro range including the Wood Body, Glider, and ACE has been improved and refined.  The S Class offers selection, performance, and value throughout the entire range.

The continued evolution of the Benz cartridge line and the culmination of years of research and manufacturing refinements, the S Class incorporates new materials, advancements in moving coil and suspension design, and upgraded styli in these Swiss hand-made phono cartridges.

The top-of-the-range LP S incorporates a higher mass brass frame for improved coupling to tonearms, evolved ruby square plate generator and an ebony body. Brass, an alloy of copper and tin, complements ebony, which is used for building musical instruments. The LP S has 50% more mass than the previous model for enhanced vibration and resonant control characteristics, thus revealing greater dynamic contrasts, deeper bass and increased resolution.

The SLR “Gullwing” is a new model in the range.   “S” stands for S Class, “L” for low output (.35mV at 3.54cm/sec), and “R” for Ruby. There is also a higher output version of this model named the SHR Gullwing (8mV at 3.54cm/sec).  This model is ideal for tube phono stages with less than 60dB gain.   The Gullwing designation is Benz Micro’s homage to the Benz Glider symbol.  At first glance, it resembles the famous Glider, but the new Gullwing is derived from the highly regarded Benz Ruby and the new LP S.   An open air design like the Glider, the SLR is the only Benz cartridge other then the LP S with a frame machined from solid brass.  The generator uses the square ruby plate and oversized neodymium magnet similar to the Benz Ruby and LP.  The Benz Dynascan S stylus, side bonded by hand to a solid boron cantilever at the Benz Swiss factory completes this outstanding cartridge. 

The S Class models of the Wood Body SL (low output), SM (medium output) and SH (high output), Glider SL, SM, SH, and ACE SL, SM, SH all incorporate the Benz Dynascan S stylus coupled to improved generators using new coil windings and refined pole pieces and damper designs. Albert Lukaschek began researching ways to increase performance and uniformity of his Crosscoil designs while developing the Benz Ebony H, L and TR models. Experimenting with the length of the solid Boron cantilever revealed how the elasticity of this very stiff material contributed to compliance and trackability of the phono cartridge. His development of a grooved rear pole piece for countersinking the o-ring damper, first introduced on the Benz Ruby square plate cartridges, was then adapted to the Crosscoil designs, given their lower contact area and damping characteristics. The lower mass coils and matched cantilevers of the new S Class retain their real world output levels and, with their improved styli, offer higher performance.

Music lovers get the best performance-to-value ratio in phono cartridges with Benz Micro, regardless of output level.

Call us at 573-696-3551 or email us at info@audiointelligent.com for answers to your questions about analog and Benz Micro.

Be sure to ask us about the generous trade-up programs to upgrade your Benz Micro phono cartridge to an S Class.

LP S-Class	Ruby 3H	Ruby 3	Ebony	SLR Gullwing	Ref S Copper

Wood S	Glider S H	ACE	MC Gold	MC Silver	MC20E2

Benz-Micro T9 Lukaschek PP-1 Phono Stage

Benz-Micro T-9 PP-1 - Front

Benz-Micro T-9 PP-1 - Circuit Layout

The small size of the PP-1 allows close placement to the turntable, minimizing signal leads from the tonearm.  The whole power supply is inboard the PP-1 chassis except for an external power transformer, which is outboard to eliminate magnetic field interaction.

The size of the PP-1 also allows all circuit components to be very close to one another. This significantly reduces circuit board traces, which could introduce noise and sonic degradation.  The PP-1 is optimized for moving coil amplification, thus does not provide switches and or jumpers for gain setting or resistive loading.  This elimination of unneeded circuit junction points preserves the low noise/high performance characteristics of this superb phono preamp.

By using only 2 transistors in each amplifier stage, perfect stability and extreme fast transient response is achieved. This provides the high degree of transparency and accuracy of the PP-1. High quality double-sided glass epoxy circuit boards with carefully designed topology (CAD) have been applied in order to ensure shortest possible signal paths. Low noise matched bipolar transistors were selected for this purpose. All resistors are high quality metal film with 1% tolerance. Within the RIAA network, only 1% polystyrene capacitors have been used, with high quality metalized plastic-film capacitors in the coupling function.

Each channel of the input amplifier stage works around a phase non-inverting 2-stage negative feedback amplifier. Available gain is set at 40dB and the upper frequency limit has been set at 650 kHz/-3dB. Input impedance has been set at 22k Ohm in order to eliminate interconnect cable and phono connector influence on the sound quality. A 10Hz subsonic filter has been incorporated between the input stage and the RIAA equalizer.

As with the input amplifier, RIAA equalization has been achieved through an inverting 2-stage amplifier of ultra high accuracy (+/-.5dB within the RIAA standard). Available gain is 22dB/1 kHz and it has an extended high frequency roll-off. This section of the PP-1 connects directly to the output of the unit. Total gain of the PP-1 is 62dB, ideal for cartridges with output as low as .2mV.

In his latest revision of the PP-1, Albert Lukaschek has redesigned the regulation circuitry of the unit's power supply, bringing across-the-board improvements in the areas of clarity, focus, and bass control.  Integrated circuits are now employed only in the pre-regulator, which provides a constant 25 volts to the independent regulators for each gain stage, which are now implemented with fully discrete transistor regulators.  The improved speed and impedance characteristics of these transistor regulators, which are now direct-coupled, bring across-the-board improvements in the areas of clarity, resolution, and focus as well as low frequency control, articulation and heft.

The new active-load, constant-voltage-source regulator allows the first gain stage to function to its fullest potential. This linear amplifier stage can now utilize a full 100x gain factor, an increase in open-loop gain over previous versions, which allows not only for improved signal-to-noise performance (vital for high-gain phono stages), but also provides better coupling to the RIAA filter and output stage.

This stage is also individually regulated with discrete transistors in a constant-load configuration. Mr. Lukaschek finds this new regulator, in conjunction with his polarity inverting RIAA filter, yields reduced distortion and a more exact implementation of the RIAA equalization curves.

The increased resolution afforded by these improvements exposed previously inaudible artifacts due to circuit board layout. Mr. Lukaschek then spent a number of months optimizing component placement and circuit-board trace layout, before the final revision was complete.

The net sonic result is a PP-1 of far greater refinement than any before. Tonal balance is slightly warmer than the previous versions, yet with far more resolution and extension. Bass is bigger and more solid; highs are effortless, open, transparent and totally devoid of smearing. Focus, soundstage depth and dimensionality, particularly on the edges of the soundstage, are much improved.

SPECIFICATIONS

              RIAA Equalization:  +/- 0.5dB
              Integrated Rumble Filter: 10 Hz (-1dB at 20 Hz)
              Gain at 1kHz: 1280 (62dB)
              Crosstalk:  Below measuring range
              Signal/Noise Ratio:  (0.5mV 0 ohm) 82dB (IHF “A”)
              Maximum Input Voltage:  5mV (1 kHz)
              Input Impedance:  22k Ohms

Retail Price:  $1750.00

Osage Audio Products, LLC ∙ P.O. Box 232 ∙ Hallsville, MO  65255
  573-696-3551 ∙ www.osageaudio.com ∙ info@audiointelligent.com
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