Self on Audio, 3rd Edition

Chapter 4Design of moving-coil head amplifiers

(Wireless World, December 1987)

Moving Coil (MC) cartridges are generally considered to have superior performance to the moving magnet kind, but they have a very low output voltage. Only the accompanying very low source impedance allows reasonable signal-to-noise ratios to be achieved. A further complication is that the output voltage varies over a very wide range between different brands. In some ways a step-up transformer to get the signal up to moving-magnet level is the most elegant solution, as no power supply is required, but it is also an expensive one, because of the need for highly effective magnetic screening to keep hum out of the tiny signals. There are also issues with the frequency ...