After years of intense research and development, the HD PHONO is finally available for discerning listeners of vinyl. The HD PHONO is the ideal complement to the HD range and the world-acclaimed HD PREAMP, HD DAC X, and HD AMP monoblocks.
Nagra’s first phono stage was derived from the Nagra IV-S reel to reel microphone preamplifier stage. Later, it evolved into the phono section of the legendary Nagra PL-P preamplifier. Ever since, Nagra has worked and improved that original design with the creation of the Nagra VPS and BPS, followed by the Nagra Classic PHONO released in 2020.
The Nagra HD PHONO follows the introduction of the Reference turntable and Nagra MC-4 moving-coil cartridge. Both the Reference turntable and MC-4 cartridge are state of the art contenders in their own rights and proved to be major assets in the finalization and fine-tuning of the HD PHONO.
The HD PHONO is a two-chassis design in which the delicate phono stage circuitry is isolated in its own CNC machined aluminum chassis. A second chassis serves to house a massive supercapacitor external power supply. Supercapacitor based power supplies provide all of the advantages of battery-based power supplies with the added advantage of accepting and delivering charges much faster and with higher current load and cycle stability than battery-based power supplies. This power supply is based on those of the HD PREAMP and HD DAC X but features a number of innovations which make it even more silent with improved performance. Both chassis are suspended in a system incorporating a damped, constrained layer platform coupled to four isolator damped towers providing superior vibration resistance.
The best of analog is incorporated in the HD PHONO. It is dual-mono, pure Class A with 100% tube stages. In addition, it incorporates remote control cartridge load adjustability from 10 to 390 Ohms, with steps as fine as 5 Ohms for smaller values. This allows perfect matching between your cartridge and HD PHONO stage – all confirmed by ear from the comfort of your listening chair.
The HD PHONO features a new generation of input transformers. Following the original VPS transformer and based on the Nagra IV-S microphone input transformers, the HD PHONO’s transformers are a fourth-generation design featuring 26 dB of gain. The new transformer’s core is made with Cobalt and is cryogenically treated over the course of several weeks to improve performance. The transformer itself is hand wound in a very delicate process requiring watchmakers’ type of skills.
