Phono Finesse Ketan Bharadia grooves to the sound of Sonneteer's Sedley MM/MC phono stage. Sonneteer are a small company whose first two products caused quite a stir here at World Towers. The Campion and its bigger brother the Alabaster are two very competent integrated amplifiers at their price points, but both have a serious flaw from a vinylesque point of view - they're line level only. Those of us who listen to the black disc have, up to now, needed to look outside the Sonneteer family for a phono stage. All that's changed with the £399 Sedley though. There's a certain understated, functional elegance about Sonneteer components which I can see going down well in living rooms across the land. It comes from the full-width black casework and brushed aluminium front panel. There's also that rare and expensive blue LED on the facia which endows the Sedley with that extra bit of class compared to cheaper green or red types. THE TECHNOLOGY Loading flexibility is one of the aces up the Sedley's sleeve. Investigate the back panel and you'll find two rows of DIP switches (one for each channel) to adjust gain (MM or MC), impedance and capacitance. The values on offer are 1OpF, 47pF, 1OOpF and 2OOpF for capacitance and 1Kohms, 47ohms, lOOohms and 22Oohms fur resistance. Should you leave all the switches open, your cartridge will be working into the MM standard of 47kohm. If none of the values above suit your cartridge, Sonneteer have left a couple of blank spaces on the circuit board so they can insert custom components. A choice of IEC and RIAA cartridge equalisation is offered as well, the former rolling off bass below 19Hz to avoid cone-flap with warped records and reflex 'speakers. Internally the Sedley runs from the same 16OVA toroidal transformer as the Campion integrated. Raw AC is first rectified before passing across a bank of eight smoothing capacitors (four 1000uF 35V, four 470uf 35V). Thence it travels to the symmetrical audio circuits, their high-quality discrete input stage followed by a single op amp in each channel. Star earthing is employed throughout, alongside Sonneteer's Active Ground. Instead of connecting the sensitive amplification circuitry directly to ground, it goes through an IC instead. Sonneteer say this lowers ground impedance below the minimum theoretically achievable with a copper PCB track, with benefits for the sound. AND IN THE BLUE CORNER... The Sedley was connected into a system of Roksan's Xerxes turntable and Artemis arm with an Ortofon MC 30 Supreme MC cartridge. Musical Fidelity's heavily class AlOOl line level integrated (which doubles as an extremely effective space heater) was then called upon to drive ProAc Response 2 'speakers on Target R2 stands. Other phono stages used for comparison included the Roksan Artaxerxes (reviewed in October 1997) with its basic power supply, which together cost around £550, and the now-discontinued Deltec 505. DOWN TO EARTH During the course of a conversation with designer Remo Casadei about the earthing socket on the back panel, I found out he recommends experimentation in this area. In spite of a certain scepticism, I tried switching between tone-arm ground connected and unconnected and was surprised to find a subtle improvement when this cable was left off. Apparently, different set-ups respond in different ways to the Sedley's grounding. Having said that, in our listening room, irrespective of whether this ground lead was connected or not, there was still a small amount of hum audible when using the Moving-Coil input which no amount of shifting equipment and cables could eradicate. Fortunately, this hum was well below the noise floor of the record itself and so wasn't intrusive. SOUND QUALITY Though in no need of a spiritual uplift I turned to the R'n'B flavoured Gospel music of Bebe and Cece Winans. What raised my eyebrows was the sense of life and zest the music enjoyed through the Sonneteer. This had a lot to do with the speed and dynamics on offer - there was very little of the compression on crescendos which a lot of hi-fl inflicts. Crisp transients were bolstered by the bass which, though taut and beautifully layered, lacked a little of the weight and power that the dearer Roksan managed. By way of compensation was the Sedley's agility and articulation. Rhythmically the Sedley reminded me of Sonneteer's integrated amplifiers and their flair for catching subtle musical accents. Reproducing these accurately highlights the natural pace and timing of the music and makes it so much involving and satisfying. Boosting the involvement factor further was the abundance of detail on offer. This, again In character with the Sonneteer amps, was presented in an unforced manner that complimented the music. On Tori Amos' Little Earthquakes, for instance, her vocals were hauntingly pure; I just stopped taking notes and listened to the album all the way through. MILES AHEAD The Sedley's enviable capabilities in terms of stereo imaging and focus were ably demonstrated by Miles' Davis' Kind Of Blue. This is a great recording, which the Sonneteer left me in no doubt of. Instrument positioning was solid, almost as if they had been bolted down in place. When Miles or John Coltrane moved a few feet forward to play a solo, you knew about it. Of course, if the vinyl front end isn't good enough, you won't hear this clarity. But the point I'm trying to make is that this £400 phono stage wasn't holding the Xerxes back, and that's no small achievement. Swapping phono stages to the Deltec 5OS I uncovered a sound that was even more solid but also smaller in scale and less transparent. The Roksan had a similar level of detail but sounded a little less exuberant and thus not as Involving. It was time to give the Ortofon a rest and try out the Sedley's Moving Magnet input with a Roksan Corua Black MM. The sound quality of this cheaper groove reader was obviously below the Supreme's but what remained was the enjoyable, detailed and metronomically timed musicality. CONCLUSION As you might have guessed I'm a bit of a Sedley convert. It gives even the excellent Artaxerxes a run for its money, even though its £150 cheaper. In some respects, like transient speed and stereo sound staging, it actually betters it. Add the flexibility of variable loading and fine build quality and you're on to a winner. WORLD VERDICT : * * * * The Sedley combines transparency and fine dynamics with excellent rhythmic ability. The one to beat. Hi-Fi World Magazine (c) Audio Publishing Ltd. Click here to go back.