@elliottbnewcombjr … Not relevant, but I have to say: Your posts are some of the most thoughtful, detailed, and helpful of anyone! I’ve been reading this forum for twenty years, and there are many super amazing contributors, but it always strikes me that your research and effort to provide guidance for people you don’t know is unmatched in my opinion. 👏🏼. Thank you. Now back to the discussion!
Advice and recommendations needed for a turntable rig...
So I have decided to add a source (analog) in one audio system I have. I will be getting a turntable, cartridge and phono preamp. Currently DO NOT have turntable in my audio system (although some 40 years I had a Thorens TD 320 (modest belt drive TT). I like the idea of a mass loading TT and interested in a heavy TT. Looking for advice from those who have used any TT set up and why. Looking in the modest budget of $3500 price range for all components. Currently looking at a Pro-ject x8 Evolution TT with a Sumiko Blue Point #3 MC cartridge and the Pro-Ject Phono Box Ds2 phonostage (a Michael Fremer positive review).
I listen to Jazz, Blues and instrument music mostly...
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@elliottbnewcombjr … If it is the Scoutmaster you’re referring to, then yeah.. it’s just doing its job well, year after year. Sometimes I’m seduced by a pretty face, or by an exciting design philosophy, but when the time comes to go head to head, it makes me appreciate what I have. I wouldn’t recommend it so highly if it didn’t earn that recommendation from me. I hope you’re enjoying your retirement. I’m still about ten years away. 🤷🏻♂️ |
I meant the Ovaltine Shaped gizmo from Bavaria. I like your VPI a lot, EXCEPT fixed cartridge tonearm. ............................................ This very positive review included this "I am glad I had so many different cartridges to play on the Scoutmaster. They helped me characterize its essential quality: accuracy. This turntable does not romanticize, nor does it impose its own sound on the music in any way I can discern. Having swapped out all four cartridges numerous times I can attest to that. I hesitate to use the term neutral because in the ears of some audiophiles it connotes sterility or, worse, a kind of sonic banality. But that’s exactly what you get here. Slap in the Grado and its fulsome midrange comes through the VPI unclouded. Or switch to the Denon (which I like so much) and there is that balanced, unhurried and unflustered sound." ......................................... I wonder how long it took this reviewer to change these 4 cartridges, on ANY fixed cartridge arm, then he says ’numerous times’. He probably owns a Jaguar 12 cylinder, a member of the Masochist club, (or a JVC TT-801, masochist membership required). Disconnect the 4 wires; unscrew the cartridge; screw in the next cartridge (often a nightmare); hook up the 4 wires; adjust overhang; adjust null points; check arm height, adjust? check azimuth, adjust (how with that or most fixed cartridge arm?) adjust tracking weight; adjust tracking force. 4 cartridges-numerous times. I’d run out of curse words and I know plenty of them. (don’t drop any nuts/washers/screws) numerous times: have some clips, silver solder, soldering skills to replace the cartridge pin clip that broke off. Insulation on clip? Rewire tonearm? I do what he did, numerous times, without hesitation, no masochist me: with my alternate cartridges pre-mounted in their own headshells. Overhang and null points done, azimuth done. If arm height is not right, my Acos Lustre GST-801 arm has the smoothest easiest arm height I ever touched, I adjust it while playing. I’m pretty quick at tracking weight, and use a blank LP for anti-skate. What I really advocate is a TT with TWO Tonearms, two cartridges ready to go; one arm with removable headshell, that arm with easy arm height adjustment. |
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