Bigbottle Ultime - Premier Dual Mono Hybrid Valve Phonostage

I think this may be the first official post about a phonostage that Alan and i have had in the works for well over 10 months!

Due to the great reception the BB3 received on it's introduction to the DIY sector and it's continuing appeal to vinyl lovers across the world in it's production form, we decided that we wanted to put together an elite phonostage that encapsulated everything we have learned, loved and treasured in the performance of the BB3, whilst improving on it.

In order to do this, we went back to the drawing board with a clear goal; Make a no holds barred phonostage that was limited only by imagination.

Whilst this design is mostly new, we have kept the things that worked well on the BB3. You can see from the 3D rendering below that there is the "MultiFET" layout incorporated into the design. We have not found a better way to provide clean MC gain, and when something works as well as this....you don't throw it out!

As this is a dual Mono phonostage, each unit will have 2 PCBs. There are now 4 valves per PCB (8 total). 3x For the phonostage signal requirements and 1 for the Power supply. You will also see the large grey blocks. They are DC Link capacitors. Chosen for their superior performance over standard Electrolytic caps in that particular position. We are also using 2x Polystyrene capacitors in critical positions. All caps and resistors are matched to our now customary 0.1% Tolerance.



PCB layout has once again been done by Craig at Craigtone Audio USA.

The BBu will see Bigbottle Audio rise to the challenge of providing "elite" performance, ingenuity and build quality, whilst remaining embedded deeply in our "for the enthusiasts" origins.

More information will be released soon!