Is idler drive better than belt drive or direct drive?

A very informative and interesting YouTube can be pulled up by:
“Garrard 301 vs Studer reel to reel”. Not only is this one of the best sound quality MP4s I have heard, it is a great comparison. When he changes from TT to Tape, you don’t want him to go back to TT!
Think it is about 15 minutes but well worth the time.

lol

When he changes from TT to Tape, you don’t want him to go back to TT!

@mglik 

If the LP was not a direct to disk then this is very easy to see. Of course a lot depends on what was used for playback of the LP in the example.

I’ll tell you OP, Reel To Reel is cool, no doubt.

I had an Akai RtoR that had direct record/playback wired from the heads to a really good Summo analog differential preamp and power amp. Went completely around the preamp in the tape unit. It was a masterpiece, for playback. That was stolen with a Fairchild 750, C22, 2, MC240., oh yea, that was a bad day, night, week, month, and year. :-)

Reel-to-Reel is really good, the problem NOW, is cost, and quality of the existing tape left. Magnetic media, degrades.. No way around it... Sure sound and LOOKS good... Fun, too!

Regards

Oldhvymec, There is LOADS of low frequency "noise" on vinyl that has nothing to do with the music. I have several recently pressed records that were obviously done on a poorly maintained lathe as the records have some of the worse rumble I have ever heard. The first time this happened I though my bearing went bad. 
Many subwoofer systems start rolling off at 30-35 hz by 18 Hz they are perhaps 6 dB down and that is only one octave. My system also doubles for theater work and there is loads of bass down there. Just watch Ford vs Ferrari. 
Rumble can be very low down as are surface irregularities on the vinyl. I use a digital high pass filter that rolls off at 100 dB/oct starting at 18 Hz.
If I defeat it the woofers will start flapping from just vinyl irregularities wasting power and taking the subwoofer drivers out of the linear part of their excursion causing distortion. Remember you have a resonance frequency between 8 and 12 Hz if you set up your tonearm correctly so these frequencies are amplified. Unfortunately, Records are not perfectly flat. You will see woofer movement in any system plating vinyl usually fairly mild as most system do not do much below 30 Hz although there are plenty of threads about flapping woofers. With modern subwoofers, amplifiers that go right down to DC and room control this can become a huge problem. Most Room control units, at least the ones I am familiar with allow you to design filters which if you play vinyl is for all intents and purposes mandatory.