Help Me Improve My Turntable Set-Up

Tekton. No, seriously. Harbeth are more subtle nuance than come alive. Tekton are spilling over with come alive. Double Impact you will go wow that’s what I’m talking about! Moab and you will be all mad scientist, "It’s ALIVE!!!"

Other things you can do that will be a big help-

Put the turntable on a Townshend Platform. Put everything else on Pods. These two changes will be huge.

You don’t mention the table but it hardly matters. Put Synergistic Green and Black PHT on the cart. Black is more dynamic/neutral, Green is more dreamy liquid, together they are the bomb! Get ECT and put them on the table, amp, and phono stage. Get HFT and put them on the Harbeth. Study the info and if you have room on your walls get a couple sets of those as well. Get some cable risers to get all your wires up off the floor. Dress them to be spaced apart and touching nothing but the risers.

A tune up like this will cost about as much as a good component, but deliver sound quality very hard to match any other way.

Duh!  Forgot something important.  The turntable is Project-Essential

Okay budget table, probably don’t want to put a $400 table on a $1200 Platform. Even though it would be awesome. Really. You have no idea how good this stuff works until you try it. But okay, I get it. In that case then use Nobsound springs. You will still get a lot of improvement, for sure more than any other thing you can get for $30. And one set will be enough to do the turntable and the phono stage. Get two sets and do your amp and pre-amp as well.

PHT will still be well worth it, and get TA-102 fO.q tape. One sheet, thin, will transform that rig, with plenty left over to help the phono stage and amps. Run a thin strip along the underside of the arm tube. Put some more on the plinth around the motor. Keep it under the platter where it won’t be seen. This stuff lowers the noise floor and kills vibration without killing dynamics, making the sound seem slightly more dynamic.

Try these first. Then once you know this stuff is for real, remove the cartridge and cut a piece to fit between the head shell and the cartridge. This will be a lot of work but you will be surprised how much difference it makes. And for way less money than the stuff designed for this.   

Another terrific cheap project is to build a sand box. One inch of sand packed down and covered with MDF or a butcher block is a terrific poor man's turntable platform. Put the whole thing on Nobsound, you won't believe it.

All that.....and no cartridge post
Amazing!?