Фонокорректоры — MasterSound Stilo

The Stilo is the phono preamplifier in the catalogue of MastersounD, the valve amplifier company founded in 1994 by Cesare Sanavio and his sons and now based in Arcugnano, in the province of Vicenza. In archaic Italian the word stilo also means style. The unit is an all-valve design running in Class A, with a moving magnet input and a separate moving coil input, and it is built by hand in Italy. Italian prices run from about EUR 5,841 to EUR 6,156 depending on the side panel finish.

Key specs that matter

Three ECC83 double triodes make up the valve line-up. Gain is 40 dB for MM and 60 dB for MC, and a low setting cuts either figure by 5 dB. The MM input presents 47 kohm, while the MC side offers resistive loads of 40, 100, 200, 400 or 800 ohm. Input capacitance offers five values - 0, 150, 270, 470 and 560 pF. Accuracy to the RIAA curve is held within plus or minus 0.5 dB, and the bandwidth runs from 1 Hz to beyond 100 kHz at 0 dB. Each input is a single RCA pair, as is the output. Power draw is 19 W. The chassis measures 35 x 31 x 12 cm and weighs 6 kg, and the wooden side panels come in walnut or black.

Engineering and use context

Moving coil signals are raised by Lundahl step-up transformers rather than by extra valve gain, and the maker describes the other parts inside as selected or custom made. The RIAA amplification and equalisation are both handled by the valves, and the circuit is built on a board with gold-plated tracks. Cartridge matching is done with two rotary switches on the unit, one for capacitance and one for impedance, while two toggle switches select MM or MC operation and high or low gain. MastersounD says it measures and matches its valves between channels and runs every finished unit for at least 48 hours before shipping, and production is now led by Luciano Sanavio, one of the founder's sons. The company is best known for output transformers wound by hand on mechanical machines, a craft Cesare Sanavio brought from his earlier work, and the Stilo shares the wooden cheeks used across its amplifiers.

Pairing

The high MC gain suits low output moving coil cartridges, and the low gain position leaves headroom for higher output types. With a single RCA output the Stilo connects to any line input, including the valve preamplifiers and integrated amplifiers made by the same firm.

Alternatives

MastersounD does not currently list a second standalone phono preamplifier, so there is no other model of this type in its range.