WiiM Ultra with MC cartridge 0.24mV feasible?

[dragonarm]

Picking up the hobby again after left off 15 years. Been an old school vinyl and CD/SACD user so I am new to digital.

Here are my left over gears:
- Turntable with ZYX Airy 3 MC cartridge (0.24mV)
- ASR phono amp
- Oppo bdp-93 for CD/SACD
- Class D power amp
- Passive speaker (Elac)

I need a pre-amp to drive this system. WiiM Ultra seems tick all the boxes, with the benefit of music streaming, which is a new area to me.

Connection concerns:
1. Only one set of "Line In". Can "Phono In" be configured to normal "Line In" so I can connect "Phono" from my ASR Phono amp, and leaving the "Line In" for Oppo?
2. Looking at the spec of the MC Phono from WiiM Ultra (MC: THD+N -58dB,SNR 56dB@0.5mV), the output of my 0.24mV cartridge might be too low to Ultra's spec, so connecting it directly to Ultra's phono might not be feasible. ASR Phono amp will need to use up the "Line In".
3. Another option is to use Toslink from Oppo to Ultra for CD signal. Don't know if playing SACD will work tho.

Happy listening!

 

[harkpabst]

1. Only one set of "Line In". Can "Phono In" be configured to normal "Line In" so I can connect "Phono" from my ASR Phono amp, and leaving the "Line In" for Oppo?

No, it's not possible.

2. Looking at the spec of the MC Phono from WiiM Ultra (MC: THD+N -58dB,SNR 56dB@0.5mV), the output of my 0.24mV cartridge might be too low to Ultra's spec, so connecting it directly to Ultra's phono might not be feasible. ASR Phono amp will need to use up the "Line In".

The output of a phono cartridge is not constant, of course. The specs also do not list the maximum output voltage but the RMS voltage at a given reference velocity, usually 5 cm/s, and 1 kHz. ZYX is a bit different here, as they specify the output voltage a the lower velocity of 3.54 cm/s, 1 kHz. This means that the output at 5 cm/s will be somewhat higher.

But still the R-1000 Airy3 "S" is one of the "lower output" low output MC pickups. ZYX also make an "H" version with double the output voltage. I suspect that the results with the Ultra could be a bit noisy. I haven't heard of of anyone using the phono input with a serious, low output MC cart, yet, so there's not much experience to build upon.

 

[canard]

adapted to the load and gain, external sut or pre-prephono to input mm...
(often a preferable solution in use of mc not only in your case)
(load for your zyx? not only gain...)
(no informations capacitance , load, headroom etc about phono input of the ultra since the release..)

in the end you will have to compare this solution to the option of your asr etc on line input (digitized)
(these are not very high-end adc solutions, but " complementary- additional", as you can imagine and yours efforts in vinyl is a "little" ambitious....)

if already a mm input (low capacitance and 47k) is correct for those wanting to rediscover vinyl in this great current fashion would be good...even a little schiso considering that in the first place it is a streamer..hihi

 

[harkpabst]

@dragonarm, just in case your high-end jargon has become a little rusty: SUT stands for step-up transformer.

A carefully chosen SUT would enable you to connect your MC cartridge to an MM phono input. Noise will certainly be lower than using the higher gain setting and the resulting resistive load might be a better fit as well. Unfortunately, WiiM did not specify the input impedance of the phono input in MC mode, yet. Transformer quality is crucial for acceptable distortion figures and sufficient bandwidth.

A phono pre-pre-amp would do the same thing, but as an active component, an additional gain stage with no RIAA compensation on its own. These have become really, really rare these days. To make any sense this would have to be a very silent, low noise amplifier, so it won't come cheap.

 

[guy48065]

...
Connection concerns:
1. Only one set of "Line In". Can "Phono In" be configured to normal "Line In" so I can connect "Phono" from my ASR Phono amp, and leaving the "Line In" for Oppo?
...

Use the optical or coax output from the Oppo.

 

[dragonarm]

Thanks for all the suggestions!

Just slowly picking up the hobby again so I'd like to start with the most economical way. Actually I am broke after buying a house haha.

I think I am gonna go with my ASR Phono to the Ultra "Line In", then Oppo optical into Ultra for the time being.

Oppa can output SACD's DSD bitstream (or PCM) thru HDMI. Is that possible to connect it to Ultra's HDMI ARC port this way?

 

[dragonarm]

Use the optical or coax output from the Oppo.

Umm....I don't see the coaxial in from the back panel picture of the Ultra. Only Coaxial Out. Is it configurable?

 

[harkpabst]

Umm....I don't see the coaxial in from the back panel picture of the Ultra. Only Coaxial Out. Is it configurable?

No, the coax is an output only. You'll have to go with the optical input, which is not a problem. The WiiM Ultra even comes with an optical cable.

Is that possible to connect it to Ultra's HDMI ARC port this way?

No, the HDMI input is for HDMI Audio Return Channel only. It uses different pins for audio than regular HDMI sound, because its intended for the opposite direction. You could connect the Oppo to a TV (if you your room for music happens to be the room for watching the telly) and then connect the TV's HDMI ARC port to the Ultra (if it happens to have one). The TV would most certainly resample the signal, though.

I think I am gonna go with my ASR Phono to the Ultra "Line In", then Oppo optical into Ultra for the time being.

That sounds like a very sensible approach.

As has been mentioned above, the analogue line input is digitized straight away. The WiiM Home App allows you to select a bit depth of 16 bit or 24 bit and a sample rate of 48 kHz, 96 kHz or 192 kHz. From the measurements we have seen so far, 192 kHz is not necessarily the best options as it adds quite some amount of noise. My personal recommendation is to go with 24 bit 96 kHz.