Why According to some Turntable extremists Pitch Control and Direct Drive is Sacrilege?

@kps25sc 

I owned a Nakamichi TT for years, direct drive made as good as the Japanese could make them back then. Tried several arms, including a Forsell linear air bearing arm, it never sounded really good.

Which one? Probably The Dragon CT ?

Because their best and extremely rare today TX-1000 was probably made by Micro Seiki. 

@chakster 
Yes , of course the same arm  n cart. Apples to apples,  always.

I'm really not as impressed with specs as you seem to be. Wow and flutter is but one measurement and also one with dubious formulas behind its final claims. Not really seeing the reason for you to say that .025 for a DD needs to be lower to be a better table. Its the same as your Lux 444, a table I owned a lifetime ago which you praise but now what are you actually saying? Its not up to par? 
Specs mean little without all the accompanying perameters to do no harm to that tiny signal. Self noise and rejection of outside vibrations is more important than .008 rpm off speed by a large margin IMHO anyway.

What does a DD motor on a cutting lathe have to do at all with playing them back. THAT'S apples to avacodos. No music is played or noise in the room when a cutting lathe cuts grooves and sits on a secure floor on a stabilized and isolated stand.
Your home environment is more hostile for noise, static, reflection and deflection of floors and walls . It means nothing as far as the superiority that a turntable needs to be DD to be the best. Thats just nonsense.  Any honest music loving anologue head will know all drives offer some exceptional playback regardless of what biased zealots claim.
We have preferences for sound, looks, and the ergonomics of use we gravitate towards. They all have strengths and weaknesses no matter how low some formulated spec is.
It's no guarantee it will sound it's best or be the best or be the general consensus that it is in fact all that. There are a lot, a real lot of non DD tables that many prefer over the technics and others. Thats proof, generalizations and biased ownership are the worst forms of choice for all. Best for those that can't acknowledge others right to choose what suits others needs and preferences of sound. I've heard very good belted units, DD's and idler drives. Very good examples of all drives exist for superb playback. In fact I heard a very well sorted idler drive make an expensive technics DD sound anemic in comparison just yesterday.  Like the folks who like the sound of their Rega over a DD......it doesn't make them wrong and your bias right. It just makes them enjoy a choice they made and prefer over something like DD that they hear as hard unenjoyable to THIER hearing , not yours or mine. I like and prefer choice and the flavor some drives bring to certain music also. Choice is good or the only question asked on this forum if some had their way would be " so what color did you get your technics in?"......

The Anvil Turntable is a very special design, actually it remains me of another great modern TT, the Salvation designed by Vic the Magician at Trans-Fi Audio in the UK (well of course).
At the time, a couple of years back I was planning to make my own TT and just came across the Anvil Turntables online. I suddenly realized that I was looking at an incarnation of Vic´s Salvation. What a gorgeous design, so simple and beautiful ! So I got in contact with Bruce to make an appropriate motor for my platter I had had a few months already. Well, you know I was very tempted to just buy the Anvil but I had my plan to complete. Bruce was very helpful but we faced platter size problems with fitting his motor  to my a bit larger platter. Long story short, we couldn´t solve our problem so I gave up ... What a shame.

Now I can´t find his turntable shop online anymore. Is he still making them, what happened to Anvil ?

@has2be I don’t care about belt drives, it’s a priori inferior technology. There is a belt with compliance, low torque .. this is what i never liked. This is enough for me to ignore this technology forever.

No single belt drive can give me what a Direct Drive can, been using japanese DD motors for about 25 years. Two Luxman PD-444, Two Victor TT-101, one Denon DP-80 is what i have now for the main system.

Sold my Technics SP-10mkII and SP-20.

If you ever seen me recommending Technics for other users it’s because nothing can compete with the current price for a brand new Technics G or GR, only some vintage Direct Drive TT can be better. And nothing can compete with the prices for top quality vintage DD like Denon DP-80, you can’t buy anything like that for the money people asking for DP-80 drive for example. It is a steal, best deal ever.

Your belt drive is a joke in this price range up to $1500, considering a good belt drive for $1200-1500 is a dream, shops selling entry level turntables for students for that money nowadays, for this price you can only buy some plastic toys on the modern market (made in china).

As i said some belt drives that i believe can be good cost $30 000 (like top Micro Seiki) and thank you, i’m better off with my Luxman PD-444 DD for under $3000 or even Technics SP-10mkII for $1500.

The prices for Garrard 301 are insane! So if you have unlimited budget for all those overpriced belt drives or idler you’re free to buy them all. But motivating people to buy a cheap junk belt drives is not what i’d like to do on the public forum.

When you’re talking about some turntables please add the models and prices, i have no idea what you’re talkling about.

While vintage Japnese Direct Drive are the most reasonably priced High-End turntables on the market it is much better to buy them for those who does not have unlimited budget. And i’m not talking about some cheap modern junk, i’m talking about exceptional Direct Drive turntables from the 70s/80s, they are still 10 times cheaper than any belt of idler pretedning to be good.

Personally i’ve never paid more than $1500 for any top vintage Direct Drive i’ve mentioned here (with express delivery to my door from all over the world).

What $1500 belt drive can compete with Luxman PD-444 designed for two tonearms in a superveavy plinth, or with Denon DP80 and coreless Victor TT-101 ???

P.S.

As much as i hate $15k modern cartridges, i hate those $30k belt drives too, i have no idea who’s buying them.

Technics charge for an SP-10R with coreless motor just $9k, even this big number is a bargain compared to many high-end belt drives on the market.

And SL-1200G is a bargain at $4k with the same coreless DD motor.

One thing that tends to be overlooked in this endless debate is that belt drive is more economically viable for the "cottage industry" turntable manufacturer.

A lot of the, in my view, baseless criticism of direct drive goes back to the 70s/80s when there was something of a smear campaign to promote certain British belt drive models against Japanese direct drives.

The truth was that the combined profits of all the cottage industry manufacturers back then wouldn’t account for a fraction of the turntable R&D costs of a company like Technics at the time.

VPI’s recent introduction of a very pricey, and I’m sure very great, DD model confirms that small manufacturers can only entertain this type of technology at prices way above what most people would find affordable.

As for any harshness in the mid range, I’ve never heard this in my own Technics SL1600 Mk2, though I did get a massive improvement in overall sound quality by fitting a KABusa silicone damper to the arm and sitting the deck on Audio Technica AT-605 feet. DD is no different from belt drive in that it can be tweaked in a number of ways.

Ultimately everyone must decide which type of turntable is best for them. There are no rights and wrongs, just opinions.

Use your ears...