phono preamp question...

**therarekind** · 04-30-2003

as i found out from an earlier post, i'm going to need a phono preamp in order to get my technics 1200 turntable to play properly through my behringer mixer (which will subsequently be hooked up to an m-audio audiophile 2496 in my Mac). i was looking at this one radio shack (yes yes, i know i can do much better, but i'm saving money and just want to listen to some records for now) and was hoping someone could tell me if this would suffice. it says it allows a turntable with a magnetic cartridge to be connected to a ceramic phono or aux input of an amplifier, stereo or boombox. well, i have no clue if the technics 1200 has a magnetic cartidge. i have no idea what that even is. could somebody possibly take a look at this webpage and tell me if it will work in my meager setup or if i need to find something different. thanks

**therarekind** · 04-30-2003

forgot to post the link.

here it is:

http://www.radioshack.com/product.as...Fid=970%2D1018

**theblue1** · 04-30-2003

I'm not so sure about that unit. Of course, there are the obvious quality issues... but I don't see any EQ switching on the unit -- and, if I recall correctly, an aux (LINE) input still requires an RIAA equalization curve -- and a ceramic phono input does not. Treating them as one-size-fits-all is questionable at best. (If I'm right, of course.) It may well be that they output with the proper EQ curve to go from a mag cartidge to an aux (LINE) level and let the chips fall were they might with the (now less common) ceramic photo input... but it's hard to say from their info.

Anyhow, it's semi-certain your table has a magnetic phono cartridge. Back in the 60s ceramic (aka 'crystal') cartridges were common because they were cheap to make and they put out a much higher output, meaning cheap hi fi makers could save money on the low-level preamp required for a typical mag cartridge. Anyhow, the easy way to tell is to determine the model number of the cartridge which should be right on it since you need that to buy new stylii (needles).

**yaron** · 05-05-2003

Originally posted by therarekind
as i found out from an earlier post, i'm going to need a phono preamp in order to get my technics 1200 turntable to play properly through my behringer mixer

what kind of mixer is it?
are you sure it doesnt have a phono input???
this is wierd....
:confused: