Build Quality / Appearance

You’ll either be a lover or hater of the Manley retro/industrial look, personally I’m a little on the fence. Something like a Stingray integrated or even the Steelhead phono is a little too much 70’s for my tastes, but the Chinook is clean and neat and actually quite attractive with its lit Manley badge on the front.

Build quality is excellent. The case/chassis is solid and heavy and the internals are well laid out with not too densely populated circuit boards.

Dimensions are: W=19″, L=11″, H=3 1/2″ and the thing weighs a measly 15 lbs or thereabouts. I want a 48 ounce T-bone not a 6 ounce filet!

Photo courtesy of manley.com

Setup and Component Matching

I set the Chinook atop three AudioPoints and also tried it directly with supplied feet. I felt the AudioPoints helped de-saturate some of the density of image, which you’ll understand more when I talk about the sound.

Cabling choices varied from the hard-wired phono cables on the Dr. Feickert Volare Turntable to cables from Analysis Plus, Harmonic Technology (Pro-Silway), Anti-Cables and several others I laid my hands on when switching this unit in and out. All of the cables worked well with the exception of the Level 2.1 Anti-cables, which in fairness were new and not broken in. Each cable brought a very small change to the sound, scarcely detectable in most instances, so I believe the Chinook to be free from any undue finickyness when it comes to hook-ups to the rest of your rig. With the Music Hall MMF-11 as source, I think the Pro-Silway edged out other cables going from TT to phono, and same on the phono to preamp.

I tried a couple power cords but settled quickly on the ESP Reference as I’ve only ever heard this cable make a positive contribution to the sound of the many different components I’ve used it with.

Setup was quick and easy. I had to remove the lid to set the gain to the lower 45dB initially, and flicking the dip switches on the rear of the unit is not my preferred way of making adjustments, but accepted as just one of those minor quirks that I have to learn to live with.

Switching on the unit there’s a 45 second warm-up cycle followed by a subtle click and you’re ready to roll.

The Sound Of Chinook

I didn’t spend any real time tube-rolling with the Chinook. It came with Tunsgram and Amperex NOS tubes and I had Electro Harmonix replacements on hand which sounded good in some ways, less pleasing in others. So the majority of listening was with the Tunsgram and Amperex NOS tubes. It’s worth mentioning that any 6922, 6DJ8, 7308, ECC88 tube can be used, so this is a tube-roller’s dream. Or nightmare, depending on your levels of OCD.

The sound of Chinook in my setup was big and meaty and gregarious, like an over-filled plate of mama’s best lasagna. Flesh on bones was the thing that really struck me most about the Chinook. It’s like stepping from a Krell Pre/Power combo to a classic Conrad Johnson setup. The music has presence, body, scale and nuance. As soon as my brain processed the increase in fleshiness it began (via my ears) to search for the obvious trade-offs – lack of dynamics, air and detail. But that wasn’t to be. Everything was there, where you’d expect it to be and with a pleasing musicality that few phonostages in my experience can muster.

Playing Duke Ellington’s ‘Blues In Orbit’ on 200 gram, (remastered by Bernie Grundman), the sound has excellent pace and vibrancy with images exploding out from a densely populated soundscape. Tracks like Three J’s Blues and The Swinger’s Jump have a high level of dynamic impact that helps give the performance a tremendously ‘live’ feel. Brass instruments have presence and solo horns pop from an inky blackness. The title track is a slow number that pitches Ellington’s piano in a duel with the horns. The sound of piano on this track is one of the best recorded pianos I’ve heard. The horns sparkle with just enough brashness and space around instruments is reconstructed wonderfully.

Since it’s my job to nitpick I have to say that the frequency extremes are where this phono preamp could be bettered. I found the bass to be quite extended but a little lacking in definition. An upright bass plucked and mixed into the background sounds sweet and fleshy and plummy but a bass synth or an electric bass placed more prominently in the mix doesn’t quite have the tautness and definition afforded by other phonos I’ve heard, particularly solid

Once the novelty of the Chinook had passed I spent an evening going through the usual audiophile check list, more for the benefit of my readers than myself. I’m going to save those results for a full Chinook review at a later date, and concentrate here on the differences between it and the Zesto Andros.

Next Up – The Zesto Andro and Comparisons With The Manley Chinook