The range of this important German manufacturer of quality analogue products has recently grown in every price range to a complete and diversified offer for every vinyl lover, through the introduction of a number of new turntables, cartridges and phono preamps. Clearaudio has raised our expectations for their products, by presenting items that have never had obvious drawbacks, apart from those (which we deeply respect) related to personal listeners' tastes. A myth, one of those legends which are common in this market, is that of the existence of a German sound, which is said to be a square and hard one, and this is probably somehow related with the surface aspect of the German language; a deeper knowledge of that language suggests that there's much more, like an extraordinary sweetness and infinite shadings. It's like confusing Hitler's speeches with Schiller or Heine's poetry. It's just a legend, which was probably born in that period when Italian magazines (taking inspiration from the Anglo-Saxon ones) considered that a correct sound was only the one with no bass and treble. Because of these preconceptions, a lot of "made in Germany" products (and also many "made in Japan" ones, and even some "made in UK or in USA", like Tannoy and Klipsch for instance) have been considered second-rate items, or items geared at easy or uneducated listeners. So, though it is an old tradition, the history of German Hi Fi seems to many people a recent one, and one of a slightly exaggerated phenomenon (it now seems that, with that lack of equilibrium which often characterizes audiophile trends, every thing German is a wonder, and that's not a reasonable assessment either). German Hi Fi has expressed a lot of significant products, often unknown to the general public ( but we'll be talking about them over the next Videohifi "issues").

 

Clearaudio is one of those manufacturers who had some troubles in becoming part of the restricted club of the world most respected ones, but it has now been producing excellent turntables, cartridges, tonearms and phono preamps for many years. The men behind Clearaudio must be congratulated for the constancy ant the coherence they have used in defending a precise family sound and build quality, and in defending a standard - the vinyl record - which was deserted by many of those manufacturers which used to be dedicated to it.It was a fearless move, in the Eighties and the Nineties, to stick to a range which was almost exclusively dedicated to vinyl, and to keep on expanding it: but in the long run it turned out to be a happy choice , as our strange market sector is rewarding this courage. And we must add that this is happening to the surprise of all those who wrote off the black disc a little bit too soon, and are now watching its resurgence after killing their analogue range. I was telling you that Clearaudio's range has been expanding again in recent times, thanks, among others, to the addition of the new, two strong, Victory cartridges series, of which I have the pleasure and the responsibility of testing the "H" model, characterised by a higher output voltage (0.6 vs. 0.2 of the one without letters after its model name). The Victory cartridges are in a mid position in the German manufacturer's range, much above the "cheaper" MM and MC cartridges, but much more affordable than cult objects like the Accurate or the Insider. We will see, though, that performances are so good that you won't feel any lack of that kind of detail that much more expensive cartridges (not only Clearaudio ones) are able to suggest.

The Victory H (like the standard Victory) has some build peculiarities, which make for a significant influence on the performance it provides. The most notable one is the fact that the coils are 24K gold, and it's not a simple luxury or some strange memory of the gold finish which was so in use during the Eighties, but a precise and conscious technical choice: gold coils provide maximal conductivity, bear a low mass and are untarnishable. The two coils have precisely the same inductance value and are perfectly balanced aside the boron cantilever. The perfect symmetry of electrical, mechanical and magnetic levels is one of Clearaudio's primary goals since their beginnings, together with a mass as low as possible for the moving parts of their pick-ups. Another peculiarity of the Victory is the cartridge body, which is made of a magnesium and aluminium alloy, being thus rigid and inert, to all practical matters impervious to external and self-induced vibrations. The total mass of the Victory is 9.4 grams, making it a solid, substantial cartridge, but one that can be nonetheless used with low-mass arms (for instance and as a reference point, it can be used both on Sme II and III series arms). Only really heavy arms, such as the Zeta, the EMT, or the Triplanar, are in my opinion to be avoided. As I was saying, the cantilever is made of boron, another precious and special-purpose material because of its reduced mass and its insensibility to the vibrations caused by sudden groove modulation changes; the stylus profile is Trigon P II, a particular parallelepiped shape, which should approximate groove shape better than other profiles.

The Victory H, thanks to its 0.6 mV output, measured at 5 cm/sec, can be used even with those high gain phono stages, not designed with low output MCs in mind. However, should you notice an invasive, obnoxious input noise, don't hesitate to connect a step up transformer or an active pre-preamp of comparable quality between this cartridge and its phono preamp. Granted, the simples the signal path, the better the sound, but let's try and avoid those extreme positions of fifteen years ago when people, in order to avoid a transformer, listened to their phono stage hiss instead of music. The Victory makes a good impression from the start, the box "has its weight": a wooden box, not inconsistent in dimensions, filled with foam. In it we can find, other than a plastic box protecting the cartridge, a rather complete documentation, including a true measurements sheet with handwritten comments, a quite complete set-up manual, which will help dispel the doubts even of those who are absolute beginners in cartridge set-up (thinking that today's world counts a lot of analogue neophytes fills my heart with joy, and even lets me think that twenty years of writings, which have often been considered more than a little bit "crazy" about analogue vs. digital, haven't been totally wasted). Last but not least, a set of Clearaudio headshell leads is included famous for their quality; the manufacturer warns against using other makes of headshell leads, in order to avoid damage to the cartridge pins. I think this statement is a little bit too strong, but Clearaudio headshell leads, which are better than most of the stock tonearm ones, certainly won't hurt the sound. Installation is made easy by the extended contact surface and by the precision of the finish, which makes for a perfect horizontal alignment between cartridge and headshell. The "perfect symmetry" philosophy can be detected by imply watching the cartridge; contrary to what is common, pins aren't centrally placed on the back of the cartridge body, but are grouped in pairs directly behind the moving coils capsules.

I mounted the Victory H on a SME Series IV arm, which was, in turn, mounted on a Michell Gyrodec MKII, profoundly customised by yours sincerely. Magnesium-aluminium tonearm, magnesium-aluminium cartridge body: the coupling seemed to be perfect. To have the signal at the correct level, and to equalise it, in order to use the line input levels of the Bryston BP1 preamp, I used both the phono preamp I usually listen to, the Audio Note M0, and the exquisite phono preamp reviewed in these pages, the Clearaudio Reference. So, I have told you about the preamp; power amplification was the duty of an old but still excellent Harman Kardon Citation IV, complemented, in order to be able to appreciate the Victory's dynamic abilities in full, by two of the five surprising channels of the Nad S 250. The speaker system is a pair of Van den Hul-rewired Tannoy Berkeley, complemented by a pair of Tannoy T50 supertweeters, crossed over at 16 kHz. At first, to be sincere, I was quite unhappy with the Victory's musical performance: good dynamics, very good frequency extension, but a 10/12 kHz peak I couldn't accept. As usual, I had only briefly browsed through the user manual and the calibration sheet: I sometimes write user manuals, I translate them, but my habit is to completely refuse to read them, only out of terminal (and terminally wrong, I hasten to add) laziness. So I had set-up the tracking weight at 2.2 grams, and I was sure that the cartridge was tracking at the best of its capabilities. And here's that peak I can't stomach; this - together with a really enjoyable transparency and detail. It might depend on the run-in, I keep on telling myself; further than that, it's early in the morning, heating is off and temperature is less than 20°C; but as time passes by, the situation remains unchanged - the general sound gets warmer, dynamic increases, but that b**** peak!

 

I am becoming slow: otherwise I wouldn't have waited so long before brilliantly thinking to have a look at the response trace. Possibly the peak was there by choice, so I would have had to disagree with the designers. It was not the response trace, but the technical notes on which my eye stood; there was it: minimum tracking weight (surprise, surprise) 2.2 grams, maximum 3.0 grams, a handwritten note telling that, for my particular sample, the minimum was 2.0, the maximum 2.8 grams. Some more effort from my tarnished memory, and I remembered that the manufacturer's notes recommend to set the tracking weight at around three grams. Ok, it's the same old habit of those who have grown up with "ultralight" cartridges, and I thought that 2.2 grams were already a respectable tracking weight; instead… I got out my Technics electronic gauge again, and raised the tracking weight to 2.8 grams. Here it came a radical change: not only the peak disappeared, but I also had the sensation of listening to an entirely different cartridge, tonally balanced, harmonically full. Dynamic range wasn't just good, it was impressive, almost overwhelming. Detail retrieval? Yes, detail retrieval was excellent, as I had already detected with the previous configuration; but I didn't expect such a micro-detail. Between my hands was a surprising cartridge, an amazing overachiever. I have used an Insider for years, thus I have a very high-level reference point. No, the Victory isn't the Insider, but the distance between the two cartridges isn't the one you would expect reading the price list. The Victory is a wonderful mix of neutrality and dynamics, therefore it is a peculiarly universal cartridge, delicate and emotional with baroque music, chamber music, small-combo jazz, acoustic rock, and explosive - but tonally and harmonically rich - with rock, symphonic music, large-scale rock. Bass frequencies are full-bodied and articulated; this characteristic, together with the already mentioned features, makes for a wonderful reproduction of Joni Michell's Mingus, - a record which is as beautiful as it is difficult to play and that becomes really spectacular, the dynamic range between the voice-guitar delicate passages and the violent bass and guitar explosions are deliciously calibrated, fluid and emotional. More or less the same can be told about Bruce Cockburn's acoustic guitar (In The Falling Dark), where you are able to appreciate the tension and the thickness of the strings, and a wonderful performance on voice to boot. Casino Royale is a beauty in wealth of detail, dynamic vividness, respect of the tone of the many instruments, with a "The Look of Love" which will give you shivers. The soundstage is ample, both in depth and in width; the image is clear, with a tendency to transparency, but not lacking in plasticity. Detail is rich, but not tedious; proportions and position of elements on the stage are well delineated but don't spoil the wholeness and the completeness of the musical event.

The only little drawback I can point out is a slight lack of authority in bass response, when a solid state amplification is used - a sort of excessive neatness, of harmonic thinness - which is simply and quickly solved by using a valve amplification or preamplification. In my case, using the Audio Note phono preamp with the Bryston-Nad combination, or inserting the Harman/Kardon power amp while using the Clearaudio phono preamp was enough. But this is reviewer's nitpicking. I think that, in the current market, the Victory has no rival (I am not saying little rivals, I am saying zero) in its price range, which is high but not unreachable.