Analog Corner

I just wanted to hear how the 'table handled the big organ's low end and the recording's overall scale. It was room-filling—you can hear the empty hall—and the bottom end was well-controlled and muscular. Regarded on its own, the sound of the Synergy was "you are there" fun, though when I played the same record through my big rig, with the Anna D, the sound was simply WOW! But come on, man: We're talking about 10 times the cost of the very competent and fine SME player. I hope the Synergy becomes the "analog goodwill ambassador" to the well-off audiophile looking to get into vinyl minus the usual variables related to setup and associated equipment: This is a great start for the "new" SME, in my opinion.

The Boulder 508 MM/MC phono preamplifier
It's difficult for me to process that 17 years have passed since I reviewed Boulder's audacious $29,000 model 2008 phono preamplifier. I wrote in that review, "I don't remember the first LP I played, but within a minute of listening I was no longer concerned with the sound of the music. What the 2008 delivered was the music's meaning." I concluded that the 2008's sonic performance was "faultless."

I was, as they say, blown away—but not as blown away as I was at an audio show I attended after that review was published, where someone in the industry (who does not manufacture phono preamps) came up to me and, in reaction to that review, volunteered, "Obviously, you don't like music." Obviously, I do. It's just that this person and I have different opinions about how reproduced music should sound. Fair enough!

Boulder's new 508 phono preamp couldn't be more different from either the full-featured, two-chassis 2008 or its recently released replacement, the 2108 ($52,000). For one thing, the 508 is housed in a single chassis, machined from a solid aluminum billet and finished to look and feel as luxurious as its 10-times-more-expensive stablemate—yet it costs a far more affordable $5000. For another, the compact (11.5" W × 9.5" D × 2.3" H), 11.5lb Boulder 508 is devoid of features.

In some ways, I think, Boulder is trying to reach the same market as SME—just from a different angle. Here, it would be an audiophile finding a way into vinyl, whose preamp doesn't include a phono section. Like the SME, it's essentially a "plug'n'play" product, with no worries about gain or load settings. Plus it's compact.

A rear-mounted toggle switch selects either MM or MC. In front there's an on/off switch and a Mute button. And that's it! Both the button and switch are machined to Boulder's superhigh standards and have a feel that makes you want to push and toggle until your fingers hurt.

Inputs and outputs are balanced only, via XLR connectors; Boulder supplies RCA-to-XLR adapters that most users will no doubt require. (While Boulder says they would "like to get everyone to use the 508 in balanced mode as much as possible," in reality, that seems unlikely to happen at this price point. But maybe . . .) The fixed MM loading is 47k ohms, while MC is 100 ohms. Gain is 44dB for MM and 70dB for MC. A low-cut filter is applied: –3dB at 10Hz, 18dB/octave. Maximum output level is 16V RMS, with distortion rated at 0.01%. Frequency response is 20Hz–20kHz, with RIAA accuracy rated at ±0.5dB. All the specs are measured at 240V, not 120V.

Obviously, Boulder's goal with the 508 was to provide consumers with as much of their products' much-heralded sonic performance as possible. One key to doing so was to make the 508 a single-PCB design, which reduces assembly time: All of the components can be fastened into the casework in a single step. Single-board construction saves money and space, but to do that correctly required a great deal of planning in order to optimize ground planes and reduce board capacitance and lead inductance. Surface-mount devices were an obvious space-saving choice: Only high-voltage or high-mass parts were through-hole–type components.

To avoid waste metal—the less waste, the more efficient and economical the production—the size of the billet was predetermined. The power supply had to be greatly simplified, but the solid-billet construction meant that a pocket could be created for it during the machining process, allowing those parts to be better isolated from the rest of the circuitry within the small chassis.

The 508's basic gain-stage design borrows from Boulder's more costly 1000 series and uses a combination of discrete and monolithic parts in a design intended to fit the allotted space but still provide dynamic wallop, wide bandwidth, and low distortion and noise—qualities that, according to a company spokesperson, Boulder didn't believe could be achieved at this price point. RIAA equalization was done discretely.

How does the 508 sound?
I put the 508 to the big test, pairing it with the Ortofon Anna D, a cartridge with a low (0.2mV) output and an internal impedance of 6 ohms. (Ortofon recommends a load that's "greater than 10 ohms.")

First, the Boulder 508 is a supremely quiet phono preamp. No noise or residual hum. Good start!

The first record I played was the brand-new LP reissue of the Dave Rawlings Machine's Nashville Obsolete (Acony ACNY-1512), an all-analog production mastered on their own lathe residing at Stephen Marcussen mastering. Rawlings and Gillian Welch wrote all the songs.

This is a natural-sounding record, and that's how the 508 delivered it. As much as (in)humanly possible, I want my colorations, if any, to come from the transducer, which is the usual coloration suspect. No piece of electronics can ever be totally neutral, but the 508 is essentially colorless in the best sense of the word, and its essential transparency, particularly in the mid to upper midrange area, proved itself on every record I played.

Nashville Obsolete is warm, pure, and unprocessed to a fault, some tracks featuring strings recorded at Royal Sound in Memphis. A warm-sounding phono preamp and/or cartridge would probably swamp the sound. The 508 allowed the innermost low-level details to emerge and presented the guitars, mandolin, and fiddle with "just right" attack and sustain; those elements sounded convincing against a noticeably superquiet background. Rawlings' and Welch's vocals were especially believable, presented with holographic realism in the somewhat distant-sounding mix.

The 508's greatest strength aside from transparency and tonal neutrality is its ability to allow musical flow. My new "go to" record for that, and actually for everything, is the Berlin Philharmonic's upcoming live, direct-to-disc recording, on their own label, of Bruckner's Symphony No.7, conducted by Bernard Haitink (90, and retired by the time you read this). Rainer Maillard engineered this using three Josephson Audio microphones (center stereo, plus left and right) and Siemens vintage tube mike preamps feeding a vintage tube mixing board going directly to the lathe.

It's a remarkably transparent production, with a three-dimensional orchestral spread that you really must hear. (I got a test pressing and was asked to write some notes. What an honor!)

In recent years, I've done most of my listening through either the CH Precision P1 phono preamp with X1 power supply or the combination of Ypsilon's MC16 step-up transformer and VPS100 phono pre. In many ways, the 508 splits the spectral difference between the detail of the CH and the richness of the Ypsilon. In terms of instrumental timbres and textures and overall resolution, I was able to hear into the orchestra as well through the 508 as through the far more costly phono preamps.

The 508 didn't produce the full size and scale the others manage, but it's plenty big; likewise, while the 508's dynamic slam is somewhat restricted compared to those, it still offers plenty. The more I listened to the 508, the more I appreciated its subtle balance of attractive (overall) strengths with only minor acts of omission that separate it from far more expensive phono preamps. It's not splashy or flashy, and it doesn't add to the picture the sorts of "wow" flavors to which some listeners are drawn at first—and then later can't help but hear and dislike. (We've all been through that at one time or another.)

That said, its transparency will not appeal to everyone, likewise its lack of adjustability, and it will especially reveal issues with associated gear in front of and behind it! For me, the longer I listened to it, the more I appreciated the 508's ability to get out of the way and let through whatever was on the record.

With the 508 phono preamplifier, Boulder stakes a strong claim to the "affordable" end of high-performance audio. Are "affordable" line-level preamps and amplifiers coming soon?

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Footnote 2: Boulder Audio, 255 S. Taylor Avenue, Louisville, CO 80027. Tel: (303) 449-8220. Web: boulderamp.com.