High mass vs Low Mass Turntables - Sound difference?

rotarius
Well, I have to correct "The Audio Doctor" because I am an engineer and it pains me to read some of the stuff on audio forums. First of all, it should not be about different philosophies, it should be about scientific fact. Saying that something more massive will store more energy and release it more slowly compared to something lighter is just plain WRONG.

its not so simple but it pains me to say I think the statement is actually CORRECT. There are other factors to consider, however, such as inertia and stiffness. Not to mention rotational moments which would obviously be much higher for heavy platters.

Manufacturers came up with cheaper plastic turntables in the 70’s and since then all manner of BS to justify saving money with a cheaper design. You only have to walk across the room to hear how badly lightweight designs perform. You can't beat physics - more mass equals greater stability.

Uh, nobody's talking about plastic turntables. What a load of hooey. I bet you had a plastic turntable when you were wearing bellbottoms.

What kind of stability are you talking about? Are you talking about foot falls feedback or other?

The reality of it is quite simple to understand,  mass and rigidity = enegy being redirected but to where?

Low mass = flexture and dissipation.

Take a light weight pan and strike it with a fork two things will occur, the tines of the fork will vibrate and the pan will vibrate and then the energy will be gone.

Take the same pan and hit it with a block of wood, you still will get a sound from the pan, and from the block of wood,  however, you will feel the energy couple back into your hand as the density of the wood will absorb some energy while bounciing energy off and some of that deflected energy goes into your hand your hand being soft and complient will take the  energy and absorb it. 

Neither of this is good. High Mass tables reflect energy which still has to go somewhere. 

Light weight tables use combinations of mass, rigidity and damping to disapate that incomming energy and internally generated energy from the motor and main bearing.

If you were 100% correct, then all the lighter weight tables, Linn, Rega, Roksan would be considered to sound aweful and these tables have been lauded over the years as excellent sounding tables.

Many years ago we compared a heavy Basis table with an acrylic and brass damped plater, with a heavy acrylic bass and an oil damped suspension to a Roksan which was considerably lighter with a lightweight wooden plinth and frame, the entire table was much lighter  in weight and the Basis sounded slow, dead, and dreadfully out of tune compared to the Roksan. 

audiotroy wrote,

"Many years ago we compared a heavy Basis table with an acrylic and brass damped plater, with a heavy acrylic bass and an oil damped suspension to a Roksan which was considerably lighter with a lightweight wooden plinth and frame, the entire table was much lighter in weight and the Basis sounded slow, dead, and dreadfully out of tune compared to the Roksan."

While that's interesting it doesn't actually win the argument of high mass vs low mass turntables because there are any number of other reasons you got the results you did. Mass is only one variable. One should not jump to conclusions based on one test.