This is a review and detailed measurements of the Lehmann audio (one word?) Decade Moving Coil and Moving Magnet phono preamplifier. It is on kind loan from a member and costs US $2099.
As you see, it comes in two boxes with the one on the left being the power supply and on the right, the preamp. A high pass filter is provided as well as four gain settings. The two boxes are interconnected using a 4-pin XLR connector:
I was disappointed to not see labels on the RCA connector. They are under the unit as well as switches to select loading. Otherwise, the two box solution looks nice.
The Decade is the mid-level unit and I think came out some 10 years ago but still being manufactured.
Lehmannaudio Decade Measurements
I measured the Decade in three gain settings:
This is good performance going by our rankings of noise+distortion as expressed in SINAD:
RIAA equalization is passive and looks nice other than a slope down toward low frequencies:
I don't understand the usefulness of the high-pass filter (dashed green). It seems more like a subwoofer crossover than rumble filter for a phono stage. Company even documents it as such saying corner frequency is 50 Hz.
Despite having an external power supply of their design, the headroom is not sufficient to deal with loud clicks and pops:
Such noises will clip, accentuating their impact. I would like to see performance twice as good.
Sweeping frequencies, we see that the headroom shrinks even more at higher frequencies:
Ticks and pops are liable to have high frequency energy making it even more important to do well here.
Back to distortion, we see that is very low:
Conclusions
I like the look and feel of the Decade although one could argue it is not $2,100 good. Noise and distortion performance is very good to excellent. Headroom is limited however.
I would not pay $2,100 for the Lehmannaudio Decade but putting aside the cost, it would go on my recommended list. You could say I have a soft spot for German engineered hardware.
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As always, questions, comments, recommendations, etc. are welcome.
Any donations are much appreciated using: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/how-to-support-audio-science-review.8150/
As you see, it comes in two boxes with the one on the left being the power supply and on the right, the preamp. A high pass filter is provided as well as four gain settings. The two boxes are interconnected using a 4-pin XLR connector:
I was disappointed to not see labels on the RCA connector. They are under the unit as well as switches to select loading. Otherwise, the two box solution looks nice.
The Decade is the mid-level unit and I think came out some 10 years ago but still being manufactured.
Lehmannaudio Decade Measurements
I measured the Decade in three gain settings:
This is good performance going by our rankings of noise+distortion as expressed in SINAD:
RIAA equalization is passive and looks nice other than a slope down toward low frequencies:
I don't understand the usefulness of the high-pass filter (dashed green). It seems more like a subwoofer crossover than rumble filter for a phono stage. Company even documents it as such saying corner frequency is 50 Hz.
Despite having an external power supply of their design, the headroom is not sufficient to deal with loud clicks and pops:
Such noises will clip, accentuating their impact. I would like to see performance twice as good.
Sweeping frequencies, we see that the headroom shrinks even more at higher frequencies:
Ticks and pops are liable to have high frequency energy making it even more important to do well here.
Back to distortion, we see that is very low:
Conclusions
I like the look and feel of the Decade although one could argue it is not $2,100 good. Noise and distortion performance is very good to excellent. Headroom is limited however.
I would not pay $2,100 for the Lehmannaudio Decade but putting aside the cost, it would go on my recommended list. You could say I have a soft spot for German engineered hardware.
------------
As always, questions, comments, recommendations, etc. are welcome.
Any donations are much appreciated using: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/how-to-support-audio-science-review.8150/
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