REVIEW

Designed & Manufactured in the UK by TALK ELECTRONICSAC - MAINS

OUTPUT1 *M5»OC 2 LIFT

manner.The soundstage was well

defined, occupying the central area

between the speakers and having

moderate depth. The absence of a

mono switch meant that surface

noise was left to occupy the

extreme edges of the sound but was

sufficiently muted that the listener

was left with an awareness of it,

rather than it being intrusive.Vocals

and Holly's lead guitar were very

defined.

Staying with guitars I came

rather more up to date with the Fun

Lovin' Criminals first LP 'Come Find

Yourself'.The opening track, The Fun

Lovin' Criminal' again showed off the

MC I's delight in projecting the beat

of music and a stereo soundstage

that showed off the position of each

performer in an area that filled the

space between the speakers, but was

again very sharply defined in both

size and performer positioning.Again

I felt the midrange to be particularly

well focused, Hughie's vocals seeming

to come from a spot a couple of feet

forward into the room.

I felt that there was a tendency

for the upper mid to be projected

a little more strongly than the

surrounding frequencies, and a

change of music to the D'Oyly Carte

performing Gilbert and Sullivan on

Decca records confirmed this.The

massed voices of a female chorus,

and the banks of violins in the

orchestra were a little too intensely

reproduced for my taste, causing me

to turn the volume down fractionally

from my customary listening level.

Male vocals, although quite firmly

reproduced and placed, stayed within

the bounds of acceptability.The plus

side of this was the perceived extra

definition given to the words being

sung.

Up to this point I had been using

the MC I powered directly off the

mains. I plugged in the PSU 2 and ran

through the same tracks again.The

first and most obvious difference was

the opening up of the soundstage

to a more three dimensional space.

Overall width remained similar,

extending to the inside edges of

the speakers, but there was more

blackness in between performers,

and greater depth. Lead vocalists and

instruments seemed to stand a bit

further forward of their companions,

and some of the sensation of

crowding in the upper midrange

frequencies was lowered. I think

this was helped by the perception

that the high frequencies extended

further and had a smoother presen-

tation.

Going back to the mono Buddy

Holly recordings and this feeling of

greater smoothness and openness

was confirmed.The sound of Holly's

guitar lost a little of its sharpness

and slightly jangley sound, but gained

in shape and texture.The shape of

rhythms also improved, making the

urge to move to

the music more

impulsive. Fine detail,

such as the way

Petty was altering

the shape of his

hands as he patted

out the beat of

'Everyday' became

more obvious, and

little subtleties of

vocal intonation

were displayed for all

to hear.

The no-

nonsense, slightly

dark presentation

of The Fun Lovin'

Criminals' music

suited the tonal

balance of the MC

I/PSU 2combo.The

bottom end drive of

the music flowing in

uninhibited manner,

the bass notes

stopping and starting bang on cue.

Back in the July 2009 edition

of Hi-Fi World, I did a group test of

six phono stages ranging from £325

to £2,OOO.This Edwards Audio pair

seemed to combine the sense of

timing of the A.N.T Kora, with the

definition of the Trichord Diablo.

I felt that it lacked the overall

smoothness across the frequency

range of the former, even with the

PSU 2 attached, and didn't match

its innately musical nature, but with

PSU the Edwards combo was still

£275 cheaper so the usual trade-off

of price versus performance held

true. In terms of definition and focus

it gave the £ 1,213.62 Trichord set

(including Never Connected Power

Supply) a run for its money, but the

latter had less focus on the upper

mid, instead giving a slightly spotlit

effect across all the frequencies.

CONCLUSIONIn terms of sound per pound, at

£250, with the option of either

type of cartridge being catered for,

the MC I offers good performance

(certainly better than the Lehmann

Audio Black CubeStatement at £325)

but lacked the overall polish of the

more expensive competitors.Adding

the PSU 2 brought the cost up to

£500 in total but resulted in a far

superior standard of reproduction

and is well worth budgeting for. I

would however, put in the caveat that

a little care be taken with equipment

matching.An amplifier or speakers

that tended to be forward in their

sound would not be well served by

the MC I/PSU 2, whilst a system that

was lacking in definition or was a bit

laid back would probably benefit.

VERDICTDetailed and engaging soundingbudget phono stage that's consid-erably improved by adding theoptional PSU.

EDWARDS AUDIO

MC1/PSU 2 £249.95

Edwards Audio

<D +44(0)8456 123388

www.talkelectronics.com

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www.hi-fiworSd.eo.uk JANUARY 2010 HI-FI 111

REVIEW

From Talk Electronics comes the diminutiveEdwards Audio MC1 phono stage;

Tony Bolton listens carefully...

new name in the hi-fi shops is EdwardsAudio, a venture for TalkElectronics, long time UK

Ibased manufacturers ofamplifiers and CD play-

ers.The Edwards range consists ofthree phono stages, the MM I (mov-ing magnet only), the MCI underreview here which caters for mov-ing coil (MC) and moving magnet

(MM) cartridges, the MC2, and theHA2 (headphone amp with passiveline level inputs).The optional PSU2,tried in this review, costs a further£249.95.

The MCI comes housed ina compact I 14.5x47.5x160mmextruded aluminium casing with awhite plastic facia containing thelogo. Instead of the customary LEDto indicate the presence of power,the whole facia glows.The backcontains two pairs of RCA phonosockets for the signal in and out, anearthing post and the small circularsocket for the power supply.Thiscan be fed either by the supplied'wall-wart' power supply or by theoptional PSU2 unit.The former is not

a normal 'off-the-shelf example but iscustom made using a split rail design

using + and - DC power outputs toreject RF noise. The gold-plated PCBis populated with high quality diodesand snubber caps.

This is housed in a matching alloy

case, with, again a backlit white facia,the back being populated by twopower output sockets and an IECmains input.There is also a switchfor lifting the earth connection.Thereis no hard and fast rule for usingthis, the best way is to try it and seewhich setting gives the most silentbackground.

The phono stage circuit topologyis described as a fully discrete inputgain stage followed by a proprietaryop-amp based active/passive RIAAfilter, followed by a totally bufferedoutput section with very low outputimpedance.

A little care is required whensiting the unit to avoid mains humfrom other components. It was notas sensitive to this as some phonostages that I have used, but stillresponded to a little experimen-tation in positioning and cable layout.Changes between MC and MM usageare accomplished by unscrewing the

back of the case, gently pulling thecircuit board out and simply changing

the position of a pair of jumpers,mounted just in front of the rear ofthe input sockets.

SOUND QUALITYAfter the customary couple of daysrunning in, I started listening inearnest. Finding myself in one of myoccasional 'guitary' moods I startedoff by playing a couple of Coral labelBuddy Holly LPs.These were monooriginals released around the time ofhis premature death at the age of justtwenty two. As a musical innovatorhe was well ahead of the crowd,starting off with straightforwardrock and roll tracks such as That'llBe The Day', and within two yearsbreaking new ground by introducing

strings into the genre in the posthu-mously released 'It Doesn't matter

Anymore'. He was encouraged inthis by his producer Norman Petty,who provided the rhythmic accompa-niment in the track 'Everyday' byslapping his hands against his knees...

All of this fell out of the CharioUrsa Major loudspeakers in a veryenergetic manner.The energy of thisbeat-driven music seemed to suit

the MCI, rhythms being presentedin a very engaging and foot-tapping

110 Htfi WORLD JANUARY 2010 www.hi-fiworid.GO.uk