Phono II Tweaks - a summary -

[LSfarzo]

Hi,
I was looking around on the forum and on the net as I would tweak my Phono II. I tweaked my kat 6550 and I had amazing results so I decided to tweak the other unit, too. I found many useful things expecially from the last threads on this forum and so I would try to make a brief summary of the expecially reccomended tweaks for this item. as all the info are quite a bit "scattered" all around..

I would ask you all if you're so kind to help me to complete this listing:

1) PIO caps for the 0.1 uF and 2.2 uF capacitors, the C12/13 and C22/23 on the latest electro diagram from WAD.
The 0.1uF cap seems to be "one of the most critical component as it is the only coupling cap". Successfuly reported used brands (in descent order) Audio Note Copper Foil (more expensive), Jensen Copper Foil, Hovland Music Caps, Dynamicap, Russian teflon (PTFE) caps. All them would do their work, some other brand (i.e. russian PIO caps on ebay) have been successfully tested. A major improvement has been reported though they're quite expensive;anyway it is worth the price. Rating: A+

2) Silver Mica capacitors for the other two couple of caps: 220pF (C22/C23) and 8.2pF (C16/C17). 1% tolerance caps are needed. Some general improvement, anyway those components seems to be quite cheap so they're worth the effort. Rating: B+

3) Tantalium Resistors.Some users experiencies report they're fine anyway it is not clear where they've been used (all resist. have been swapped??) and wich brand has been used.. Do AN resistors perform the same as many other common brands (which are really less expensive)?. This item has to be completed with the resistors ID to be swapped and with the brands. Rating B+

4) ECC83: which brands to look for? Are the substitution really worth the effort? Rating:?

5) The internal wiring: the wire for the input from the arm cable (the original one is a braided one) seems to be very critical though no info have been found about some other types which would have been successfully tested. Rating ?

6) Phono II 1st stage battery bias. A good tweak but it requires you to change the hardware and not only a component swapping.. Seems to result in a very good improvement. Rating: A-

Please if you have some other suggestions, improvements or if you have comments please report so we could try to organize a list of modding to be tried.

Thank you
Luca,
Italy