Phono Box E

The time had come to replace the OM10 stylus on my Pro-Ject Essentials turntable which was coupled with a Little Bear valve preamp from new. Whilst the Little Bear gave warmth the sound seemed narrow and muddy and no matter how well grounded it was, it still generated noise; not overpowering but noticeable between tracks and during quiet passages. Replacing the stylus with a new OM10 and swapping the Little Bear for the Pro-Ject Phono Box E was like the difference between night and day. Ok so the stylus needs to bed in and until it does the sound is a little bright, but the Phono Box E is truly amazing and punches above it's weight in a way that it has no right to in it's price bracket. The sound stage is wider, bass response is controlled and punchy and I'm hearing much more and far clearer in tracks than I ever remember on albums that are up to 75 years old! And the best part...absolutely zero noise. There are better and far more expensive setups than mine but as far as phono preamps go you'd be hard pushed to find anything that performs anywhere near as good as the Pro-Ject Phono Phono Box E without spending an awful lot more money.

Previous preamp was very cheap. Hummed!! This is the real thing from well respected audio designers/manufacturers in Austria. Solid little thing. It’s an older model of their current base model but I needed something to a budget and this is fine. Seems to clean up the signal from my old Pioneer turntable from the 70’s as well as adding the voltage gain. Provides a nice clean signal to my old Sonos Zone Player.

I've had a Pro-Ject Elemental turntable since 2015, which I love and would recommended to anyone! I bought a cheap (about £20) Behringer phono preamp to go with it at the time, which worked fine, but felt the time had come to upgrade. It feels like you can go round and round in circles trying to choose the right preamp on Amazon, and it didn't seem to matter if you spent £20 or £300+ someone always had a bad word to say about this one or that one! So I decided to take a chance on the Pro-Ject as it suited my price bracket and hoped it would deliver a better sound than the previous one, which it has! The Pro-Ject preamp attaches like my previous one via a L&R line-in from the turntable and a L&R line-out to my stereo (Technics mini HI-FI stack system) there is also a GND on the back of the preamp box for your turntable ground cable to attach to. Overall I'm really pleased with the sound quality it's produced, it's much clearer and more powerful than my previous Behringer one. I would say about +10bd difference, which means I don't have to turn the stereo's volume up so high anymore (which when playing a CD at that volume would have been far too loud), the volume is now almost level with that of a CD. The only slight downside (which is why it's not got 5 stars) was that there is a low hum/buzz present even when the GND cable is connected and the power cable itself is very short (just less than 1 meter). Researching the hum/buzz issue, it seems to be a common problem attributed to not grounding the unit properly. As a first step, I decided to swap the power cable from my old Behringer preamp and try it with the Pro-Ject, it offered a longer cable anyway and was the same style sealed plug with the same voltage range. This seems to have taken the hum down to a barely audible level, which is great! It also means that perhaps there isn't a ground wire present in the plug supplied with the Pro-Ject, I can only assume. Overall though really happy and will definitely stick with this Pro-Ject preamp for the foreseeable future!

This clever little box just sits and works....no controls ...no on/off switch... Really good quality pre-amp for a record deck.Grounding connection wasn't necessary with my equipment Rega Rp1 and Cambridge Ax35. Well recommended. Soundstage seems wider and has a greater level of detail from well produced vinyl...

Bought this as the phono card in my amp had a crack and my turntable was no longer usable as a result. Plugged this little bad boy and I was up and running again listening to my vinyl collection. Very happy indeed!

If you're just starting out with turntables and you're currently using a built in phono stage, buy this! For the price, it's amazing and really opens up the sound stage and bring the record to life.

Needed a phono amp to connect a Sony PS-LX66 to a Wiim Amp. I rarely listen to vinyl and it doesn't warrant spending very much. Tried a Fosi Box X2 clone by Douk - Awful sound, possibly faulty! £68 Tried a PP400 clone by Prozor - Nice sound, poor gain! £26 The Phono Box E had the best overall sound and musicality of the three and acceptable gain. It did however produce the most noise which was audible when not playing. Using a spare core of copper mains cable from the ground post to a nearby radiator removed it completely. Good value for £45 as it has the same internals, just in a plastic, less shielded, case than the Phono Box MM, and £24 cheaper and better looking for the same sound! If I however was a vinyl head with an extra £120 to spare I would definitely step up to a Musical Fidelity or Schitt.

Want a no frills phono box that just does job?....look no further, this little box is the one you need. I tried others and none of them satisfied on the sound quality. This was right from the word go. Excellent sound quality, good volume output, well made....what more do you want? Buy it.