I use the ability to change SRA (VTA) easily on the fly during my initial setup of a cartridge. I have found extremely small changes are noticeable once I am very close to my target... prior to being close to the proper target larger changes of SRA do not produce very noticeable changes in the produced sound. I do not change the SRA after spending the time to find the best setup in my system. My final adjustment increments are less than 0.1mm and can take a couple of days to finalize.
VTA on the fly
Of the four tonearms I own, they all have VTA on the fly. Several months ago I had a small club meeting at my house for Classical music with LP's.
Now this is really interesting, one of the attendees claims to have a 30,000 LP record collection. This gentleman in his mid 70's is very familiar with the Boston Symphony Hall and orchestra. When I played a Boston Symphony record that he brought, he claimed there should be more bass. While the record was playing I turned the micrometer one half turn clockwise, and there was according to him the right amount of bass. He then asked me what I did, because he seemed startled, and had no idea.
Think of it, an audiophile that loves and has been playing LP's for over fifty years, but had no idea of the advantages of VTA on the fly.
Now this is really interesting, one of the attendees claims to have a 30,000 LP record collection. This gentleman in his mid 70's is very familiar with the Boston Symphony Hall and orchestra. When I played a Boston Symphony record that he brought, he claimed there should be more bass. While the record was playing I turned the micrometer one half turn clockwise, and there was according to him the right amount of bass. He then asked me what I did, because he seemed startled, and had no idea.
Think of it, an audiophile that loves and has been playing LP's for over fifty years, but had no idea of the advantages of VTA on the fly.
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- 34 posts total
I have found extremely small changes are noticeable once I am very close to my target...Me too. My first experience setting VTA was a Glider on the Graham 2.0 arm. Starting from the recommended near parallel eyeball method I listened and it sounded pretty good. Impressively good! Awful lot of guys would be happy and done right there. Because it sounded so good I assumed it had to be awfully close and so I lowered it down only a teeny tiny little bit. Way less than 1mm. It sounded a whole lot better. So I did it again. Better. After doing this half a dozen times I got the feeling this could take forever at this rate so dropped it down near a full mm. Better. Again. Better! Dang! Eventually, sure enough, lowering made it worse. When high the balance was thin and tipped up a bit. Lowering brought more fullness. Until suddenly it brought bloat. So back up. Split the difference. Back and forth, up and down, splitting the difference, interpolating, until finally the sound kind of snaps in with supreme focus, clarity and balance. Those last few micro adjustments were so small, there's just no way anyone gets there without VTA on the fly. No way. VTA on the fly is no gimmick. Its essential. Graham accomplished this with a side screw mechanism that came with the downside of being mechanically weak. So Graham added a set screw to lock in once VTA is set. Unfortunately locking the set screw changes VTA and is nowhere near as solid as if it wasn't there anyway. So much for the Graham. The Origin Live Conqueror arm I have now uses a clever little mod bought from a fellow audiophile. It slides over the arm mounting tube and the arm rests on it allowing smooth VTA with no loss of mechanical stability. Only problem is it has no calibration marks, and causes the whole arm to rotate. So I had to mod his mod with my mod to finally have the perfect mod! https://systems.audiogon.com/systems/8367The brass ring is his mod, the acrylic ring, measuring marks, and teak wood peg are my mods, and together VTA micro-adjustments can be smoothly done on the fly and reliably recreated in seconds. Its amazing there are so many audiophiles that obsess over so much of turntable setup, in the most minute detail, spending incredible sums on all kinds of gadgets and gizmo's, then gloss over this one that is probably more valuable than all the others put together. |
- 34 posts total