Lyra Kleos
We are late … I mean that we are late in introducing this Lyra Kleos that is not a new product. Nevertheless sometimes it is useful to keep a spotlight on a product that we reckon interesting, especially when, like in my case, you buy one for yourself after having listened to its performances in your friends' houses. Yes, Kleos is my new cartridge since last Christmas.
The Lyra Kleos is the second cartridge from the bottom up of the Lyra pricelist.
Before the Kleos there is the Delos that is the substitute for the old Dorian, that for many audiophiles represented the starting point towards high level analogue hi-fi. The Dorian evidenced a bit too much the extreme frequencies (especially the higher ones that in some situations were not easy to control), while the Delos brought back the sound to a bigger neutrality. The Kleos follows these steps, may be more than the Skala, an excellent cartridge (I already wrote about it and you'll find my notes online), but it is not as extended in the high range as the Kleos is and with a bottom range more tonic. Some people say its sound is somehow more romantic. The names of the builder, designer, project manager and tester are not of a great use here since you can find everything on the manufacturer's website.
The Lyra Kleos is the second cartridge from the bottom up of the Lyra pricelist.
Before the Kleos there is the Delos that is the substitute for the old Dorian, that for many audiophiles represented the starting point towards high level analogue hi-fi. The Dorian evidenced a bit too much the extreme frequencies (especially the higher ones that in some situations were not easy to control), while the Delos brought back the sound to a bigger neutrality. The Kleos follows these steps, may be more than the Skala, an excellent cartridge (I already wrote about it and you'll find my notes online), but it is not as extended in the high range as the Kleos is and with a bottom range more tonic. Some people say its sound is somehow more romantic. The names of the builder, designer, project manager and tester are not of a great use here since you can find everything on the manufacturer's website.
The Lyra products have the reputation of being very good products, good sounding cartridges. We know them well and I can confirm that also the Kleos is up to the brand's reputation. What about its price? 2.650,00 euros. It is not cheap, I know, but it is in a price range that can be afforded, maybe with a little effort, without getting to the price range of the Tytan i/Etna or the Olympos/Atlas. I am not saying that it is cheap; I know it is not but in the panorama of high range cartridges it is a price that I have to define common.
The Kleos is a low output moving coil cartridge (0,5 mV at 5 cm/sec) with an internal impedance of 5,4 Ohm; with an active phono premplifier the recommended load goes from 95,3 to 816 Ohm, as stated in the facts on the producer's website that are a bit different from those of the original cartridge user's manual. In the website there is a key to choose the best load. But I'll come back to this later on.
It has a 0.3 mm diameter Ogura Solid Boron Rod and a Diamond Stylus: 3x75 µm Lyra designed Ogura long footprint Line Contact. No gold or other precious metal, only iron core and 6N copper coils.The part in contact with the armtube shell is in aluminium, weighs 8.8 gr and has a narrowed mounting area to improve energy transfer.
The Kleos is a low output moving coil cartridge (0,5 mV at 5 cm/sec) with an internal impedance of 5,4 Ohm; with an active phono premplifier the recommended load goes from 95,3 to 816 Ohm, as stated in the facts on the producer's website that are a bit different from those of the original cartridge user's manual. In the website there is a key to choose the best load. But I'll come back to this later on.
It has a 0.3 mm diameter Ogura Solid Boron Rod and a Diamond Stylus: 3x75 µm Lyra designed Ogura long footprint Line Contact. No gold or other precious metal, only iron core and 6N copper coils.The part in contact with the armtube shell is in aluminium, weighs 8.8 gr and has a narrowed mounting area to improve energy transfer.
Few thoughts.
First. Lyra suggests tangential tonearms or classic pivoted. I have tried both the tonearms of my Pioneer PL 550 and a Rega 700 pivoted. The result is a wonderful outcome, a secure tracking, the bottom range is still and a bit opened as it is with that tonearm. Using the Morch DP6 that is not exactly the type of tonearm recommended by Lyra, I have not noticed a big difference in the tracking of the low frequencies. This tonearm is a dual pivot and it does not move in your hands like the classic unipivot. Lyra and Graham, that is unipivot, get along well but also in this case the tonearm is held back by a magnet positioned on the left side, looking at the tonearm from the front.
I have an indirect experience with unipivot tonearms in fact my friend Stefano uses a Lyra Dorian on a VPI tonearm and my friend Dario uses an Olympos on a Vector tonearm and in both cases the cartridges play well. All in all, if not for a particular obsession of the owner, this Kleos seems to me to be adaptable to many tonearms (and with this I do not mean to do always the contrary of what Lyra suggests).
Second.
The VTA. It must be adjusted carefully to let the new system of coils alignment to work properly. Differences are clearly audible and the preference is for a perfect parallelism with the vinyl surface.
Third.
The weight. The suggestion given from 1,65 to 1,75 grams with best results at 1,72 is amusing. Hope you have a precise scale at home. With the weight at 1,65 the sound was lacking in the low range with some tracking problems. Within 1,75 and 1,72 I have not noticed differences but if Lyra gives a suggestion I usually trust them and follow it.
Fourth.
The tonearm mass. Lyra suggests a medium mass tonearm. I know that someone believes that the mass is not a very important parameter (I’ve seen high compliance cartridges, like my Denon DL S1, working on heavy arms, with perhaps shell very heavy that carry the resonance frequency dangerously low); however I have used both the Red (6 gr) and the Blue (14 gr) arm tubes on my Morch tonearm. After a settling of a few days with the Red one, the low range had wrong proportions and I was afraid to have chosen badly. The resonance frequency was not particularly high (11 Hz, both vertical and lateral, with the Ortofon test disc), but in correspondence with the said frequency the cartridge “jumped” in the groove with oscillations in the vicinity of 2-3 millimeters; it seemed to ask please damp me, I pray thee! With the Blue armtube the resonance frequency went down to 9 Hz and in correspondence of this frequency the cartridge did barely move, surely less than with the Red armtube. Therefore don't be mislead in your judgments, check that also the mechanical linking is the right one one.
Fifth point.
The electrical coupling with the phono preamplifier. I have to say that the site does not show "from 10 to 47,000 Ohm" anymore, an indication that meant everything and also its contrary. There is a legend that is really easy to read enclosed in the attached instructions to the package of the cartridge; it is true that you need to know the capacity of the cable that goes from the connectors of the cartridge to the phono pre and in this case the Morch is very precise; but other producers are precise too. In any case, even for those who have a phono with a fixed input and 100 Ohm load, I can say that I have not heard differences such as to upset the sound from 100 to 500 Ohms so I preferred the former, setting at 100 Ohm the American Hybrid Technology load.
Finished? Yes, except for my compliments to Lyra for the stylus guard and for the fact that no locknuts are necessary so one can work easily until you do the setup that I suggest to do keeping as a reference the cantilever.
The system used for this review is: Bauer Audio DPS2 turntable, Morch tone arm DP 6 with Precision Red armtube (I used a Nanotec cable between arm and pre-phono, the PH 2/S of which I refer here below), American Hybrid Technology -P phono preamplifier, line preamplifier Lavardin 6.2, power amplifiers Spectral DMA 50 and Wyred 4 Sound ST 250, the Audio Note AN AN E Spx speakers and the wiring repeatedly cited in my previous reviews.
During the first hours the sound of this Kleos was a bit confused. It was not perfectly tuned. But all this is normal and I mention it just to warn all those who at a first listening may be a bit disappointed. Wait a bit and that sense of confusion, together with the predominance of the mid range and of the medium-high range, will disappear. Just a few records and a top range very opened and never annoying will appear. Often the top range of some cartridges seems to be disconnected with the medium-high range, as if the cartridge had a spur of its own for the more acute ranges. It is not so with the Kleos which instead has a remarkable continuity and reminded me of my past experiences with the Titan i and especially with the Olympos. The low range is more full-bodied if compared with some of the previous models but it is very fast and respects the rises and decays of the music signal. In this way a cello seems to be more real than that reproduced by the Argo or the Helicon. We say that the frequency response seems now more flat with respect to some previous models, in which sometimes the acute range took over.
The absence of grain, the ability of tracking laser-style, the finesse and precision of the timbres, makes you think that the natural competitor of the Kleos may be the old Titan i, that is very similar to this Kleos. It is for sure different from the Skala that in my listening room appeared just a bit darker.
After all of this compare, thinking, wondering, I started to listen carefully, trying to find something that was not right. But in reality, I realized that the continuity of medium/medium-high range give the right timbre to some orchestral unities. The woodwinds for an instance many times loose their natural sound, but not here. It may sound I am an “hair splitter” but those who sit for the first time in a concert hall notice straight away that the sound of the woodwinds is very different from that heard from the hi-fi at home.
As I wrote in the review of the Skala, the real-like effect of the strings in the Decca recording "La Fille mal Gardee" is very much present here and since I am an inveterate musiclover, to hear violins opened but that do not squeal is for me a great pleasure. And also with the Kleos there is the glossiness of the woodwinds and the violence of the percussion.
Voices with the Kleos sound very natural. Listening to the Missa Bell'Amfitrit Altera by Orlando di Lasso (Simon Preston, Argo) I hear very rich hues of the timbre and right ambiance echos and the space placement is exact. The ability of this cartridge to track the grooves is very high and this is something rare in cartridges of this price range that is not cheap but it's affordable.
The management of the large orchestral masses is not affected by compressions of any kind; the aforementioned tracking capability helps to keep the sound clear and especially with the more complex signals the Kleos shows its great ability and its characteristics that put her on a higher level. I listened to some of my favorite recordings: Stravinsky, Shostakovich, Mahler, Bruckner, Richard Strauss and quite frankly, I have never detected sign of confusion, or wrong instruments collocation. I have listened to the Miserere by Arvo Part (ECM). This is not an easy piece of music but this Kleos played it from beginning to end without any hurdle, all the details were present, such as the details of the small organ pipes or the violence of the percussions.
The Kleos disappears when there are recordings that are very well made. This is what happened with Ponomarev's trumpet in A Night in Tunisia, Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers (Philips Direct Mastering) or with the string orchestra of the Sei Introduttioni Teatrali di Locatelli (Fonè). The only limit to the sensation of having the performers in front of me was the dimension of my room that is not as big as an auditorium.
In conclusion, as the Kleos arrived at my place I installed it and told Angelo Jasparro that I had a new entry at home. He was very curious and came straight away to have a listen at my place. From that moment on he kept on thinking about the Kleos. Soon he called me and told me that he changed his cartridge. And guess what? He bought a Kleos too.
Domenico Pizzamiglio
Manufacturer: Lyra Connoisseur
First. Lyra suggests tangential tonearms or classic pivoted. I have tried both the tonearms of my Pioneer PL 550 and a Rega 700 pivoted. The result is a wonderful outcome, a secure tracking, the bottom range is still and a bit opened as it is with that tonearm. Using the Morch DP6 that is not exactly the type of tonearm recommended by Lyra, I have not noticed a big difference in the tracking of the low frequencies. This tonearm is a dual pivot and it does not move in your hands like the classic unipivot. Lyra and Graham, that is unipivot, get along well but also in this case the tonearm is held back by a magnet positioned on the left side, looking at the tonearm from the front.
I have an indirect experience with unipivot tonearms in fact my friend Stefano uses a Lyra Dorian on a VPI tonearm and my friend Dario uses an Olympos on a Vector tonearm and in both cases the cartridges play well. All in all, if not for a particular obsession of the owner, this Kleos seems to me to be adaptable to many tonearms (and with this I do not mean to do always the contrary of what Lyra suggests).
Second.
The VTA. It must be adjusted carefully to let the new system of coils alignment to work properly. Differences are clearly audible and the preference is for a perfect parallelism with the vinyl surface.
Third.
The weight. The suggestion given from 1,65 to 1,75 grams with best results at 1,72 is amusing. Hope you have a precise scale at home. With the weight at 1,65 the sound was lacking in the low range with some tracking problems. Within 1,75 and 1,72 I have not noticed differences but if Lyra gives a suggestion I usually trust them and follow it.
Fourth.
The tonearm mass. Lyra suggests a medium mass tonearm. I know that someone believes that the mass is not a very important parameter (I’ve seen high compliance cartridges, like my Denon DL S1, working on heavy arms, with perhaps shell very heavy that carry the resonance frequency dangerously low); however I have used both the Red (6 gr) and the Blue (14 gr) arm tubes on my Morch tonearm. After a settling of a few days with the Red one, the low range had wrong proportions and I was afraid to have chosen badly. The resonance frequency was not particularly high (11 Hz, both vertical and lateral, with the Ortofon test disc), but in correspondence with the said frequency the cartridge “jumped” in the groove with oscillations in the vicinity of 2-3 millimeters; it seemed to ask please damp me, I pray thee! With the Blue armtube the resonance frequency went down to 9 Hz and in correspondence of this frequency the cartridge did barely move, surely less than with the Red armtube. Therefore don't be mislead in your judgments, check that also the mechanical linking is the right one one.
Fifth point.
The electrical coupling with the phono preamplifier. I have to say that the site does not show "from 10 to 47,000 Ohm" anymore, an indication that meant everything and also its contrary. There is a legend that is really easy to read enclosed in the attached instructions to the package of the cartridge; it is true that you need to know the capacity of the cable that goes from the connectors of the cartridge to the phono pre and in this case the Morch is very precise; but other producers are precise too. In any case, even for those who have a phono with a fixed input and 100 Ohm load, I can say that I have not heard differences such as to upset the sound from 100 to 500 Ohms so I preferred the former, setting at 100 Ohm the American Hybrid Technology load.
Finished? Yes, except for my compliments to Lyra for the stylus guard and for the fact that no locknuts are necessary so one can work easily until you do the setup that I suggest to do keeping as a reference the cantilever.
The system used for this review is: Bauer Audio DPS2 turntable, Morch tone arm DP 6 with Precision Red armtube (I used a Nanotec cable between arm and pre-phono, the PH 2/S of which I refer here below), American Hybrid Technology -P phono preamplifier, line preamplifier Lavardin 6.2, power amplifiers Spectral DMA 50 and Wyred 4 Sound ST 250, the Audio Note AN AN E Spx speakers and the wiring repeatedly cited in my previous reviews.
During the first hours the sound of this Kleos was a bit confused. It was not perfectly tuned. But all this is normal and I mention it just to warn all those who at a first listening may be a bit disappointed. Wait a bit and that sense of confusion, together with the predominance of the mid range and of the medium-high range, will disappear. Just a few records and a top range very opened and never annoying will appear. Often the top range of some cartridges seems to be disconnected with the medium-high range, as if the cartridge had a spur of its own for the more acute ranges. It is not so with the Kleos which instead has a remarkable continuity and reminded me of my past experiences with the Titan i and especially with the Olympos. The low range is more full-bodied if compared with some of the previous models but it is very fast and respects the rises and decays of the music signal. In this way a cello seems to be more real than that reproduced by the Argo or the Helicon. We say that the frequency response seems now more flat with respect to some previous models, in which sometimes the acute range took over.
The absence of grain, the ability of tracking laser-style, the finesse and precision of the timbres, makes you think that the natural competitor of the Kleos may be the old Titan i, that is very similar to this Kleos. It is for sure different from the Skala that in my listening room appeared just a bit darker.
After all of this compare, thinking, wondering, I started to listen carefully, trying to find something that was not right. But in reality, I realized that the continuity of medium/medium-high range give the right timbre to some orchestral unities. The woodwinds for an instance many times loose their natural sound, but not here. It may sound I am an “hair splitter” but those who sit for the first time in a concert hall notice straight away that the sound of the woodwinds is very different from that heard from the hi-fi at home.
As I wrote in the review of the Skala, the real-like effect of the strings in the Decca recording "La Fille mal Gardee" is very much present here and since I am an inveterate musiclover, to hear violins opened but that do not squeal is for me a great pleasure. And also with the Kleos there is the glossiness of the woodwinds and the violence of the percussion.
Voices with the Kleos sound very natural. Listening to the Missa Bell'Amfitrit Altera by Orlando di Lasso (Simon Preston, Argo) I hear very rich hues of the timbre and right ambiance echos and the space placement is exact. The ability of this cartridge to track the grooves is very high and this is something rare in cartridges of this price range that is not cheap but it's affordable.
The management of the large orchestral masses is not affected by compressions of any kind; the aforementioned tracking capability helps to keep the sound clear and especially with the more complex signals the Kleos shows its great ability and its characteristics that put her on a higher level. I listened to some of my favorite recordings: Stravinsky, Shostakovich, Mahler, Bruckner, Richard Strauss and quite frankly, I have never detected sign of confusion, or wrong instruments collocation. I have listened to the Miserere by Arvo Part (ECM). This is not an easy piece of music but this Kleos played it from beginning to end without any hurdle, all the details were present, such as the details of the small organ pipes or the violence of the percussions.
The Kleos disappears when there are recordings that are very well made. This is what happened with Ponomarev's trumpet in A Night in Tunisia, Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers (Philips Direct Mastering) or with the string orchestra of the Sei Introduttioni Teatrali di Locatelli (Fonè). The only limit to the sensation of having the performers in front of me was the dimension of my room that is not as big as an auditorium.
In conclusion, as the Kleos arrived at my place I installed it and told Angelo Jasparro that I had a new entry at home. He was very curious and came straight away to have a listen at my place. From that moment on he kept on thinking about the Kleos. Soon he called me and told me that he changed his cartridge. And guess what? He bought a Kleos too.
Domenico Pizzamiglio
Manufacturer: Lyra Connoisseur
Phono Interconnect Cable NANOTEC SYSTEMS PH 2/S
During the test of the Lyra Kleos I had the opportunity to listen to this cable manufactured by the Japanese Nanotec Systems. I had tested the interconnect cables of this producer in another review for another magazine.
I was very intrigued by the outcome that I may have obtained using the Nanotec PH 2/s equipped with a SME connector..
Nanotec cables are characterized by the presence of pure copper "painted" with a material that contains micro particles of noble materials (gold and silver) in a variable percentage. With this treatment the conductivity of the metal that transfers the signal is improved.
This cable costs 780,00 euros (Italian MSRP), it is 1,2 meters long and is very flexible. This may be an advantage when using a turntable with suspended chassis.
What is the result using this cable? At the beginning the acute range seems to be attenuated; in reality some harsh sounds disappear and make the high range more alive and at the total advantage of a greater cleanliness. It is enough to listen to recordings such as the New Year's Eve Concert 1979 (Boskoski, Decca) to realize that the violins are always clear and the various metal percussion (cymbals, triangle etc) are also real, and there is no distortion of the natural timbre of the instruments.
The low range is controlled, well delineated, always free of any exaggeration as it always is with Nanotec. The mid range is clear and with a detailed timbre.
Well, since the phono cable brings the weak signals that come from the cartridge (and with MC cartridges the signal is even more weak), the less traumatic the passage is the better. This Nanotec surely does a good job. It is not a cable that is fit for everyone, its cost is not justified with some set-ups. But if it is a high set-up I would give it a try.
In Audio-Activity.com we do not review cables unless it is something really special. It must be something that fixes the characteristics of linearity and cleanliness of the signal that comes from our Systems. In this case I had such a result that it was worth making an exception.
Domenico Pizzamiglio
Manufacturer: Nanotec
Translation: Francesca Rubino
I was very intrigued by the outcome that I may have obtained using the Nanotec PH 2/s equipped with a SME connector..
Nanotec cables are characterized by the presence of pure copper "painted" with a material that contains micro particles of noble materials (gold and silver) in a variable percentage. With this treatment the conductivity of the metal that transfers the signal is improved.
This cable costs 780,00 euros (Italian MSRP), it is 1,2 meters long and is very flexible. This may be an advantage when using a turntable with suspended chassis.
What is the result using this cable? At the beginning the acute range seems to be attenuated; in reality some harsh sounds disappear and make the high range more alive and at the total advantage of a greater cleanliness. It is enough to listen to recordings such as the New Year's Eve Concert 1979 (Boskoski, Decca) to realize that the violins are always clear and the various metal percussion (cymbals, triangle etc) are also real, and there is no distortion of the natural timbre of the instruments.
The low range is controlled, well delineated, always free of any exaggeration as it always is with Nanotec. The mid range is clear and with a detailed timbre.
Well, since the phono cable brings the weak signals that come from the cartridge (and with MC cartridges the signal is even more weak), the less traumatic the passage is the better. This Nanotec surely does a good job. It is not a cable that is fit for everyone, its cost is not justified with some set-ups. But if it is a high set-up I would give it a try.
In Audio-Activity.com we do not review cables unless it is something really special. It must be something that fixes the characteristics of linearity and cleanliness of the signal that comes from our Systems. In this case I had such a result that it was worth making an exception.
Domenico Pizzamiglio
Manufacturer: Nanotec
Translation: Francesca Rubino