Anyone heard the Sota Millenia?

Turntable selection is a personal choice.You have to factor size,and your ability to accomodate some of the rather large "Beasts",as well as price.There is a TON of really good designs,in quite a few price categories.I LOVE a load of them.I can't wait to win the lottery,so I can collect.

That aside,as an owner of the latest COSMOS,and a SOTA user for twenty years,I have to say that I've never experienced any bearing noise,or vacuum problems,as some competitors like to believe exists.I am not married to this product line,but they are absolutely superb,when you factor sound/features/size/price.Personally I like the Cosmos way more than the Millenia,which is really the same table,but without the gorgeous housing(the Cosmos has the same,very effective "Swiss Cheese" sub-assembly,but you don't have to look at it),and the Millenia dispenses with the motor on the NON RESONANT subassembly,and puts it in a cute seperate housing,which cannot be as effective(though I'm sure it works)in speed stability,as placing it on the sub-assembly.Hey everyone has their own tastes.

One thing that has always confused me is,why would one want a belt,and innerworkings of a moving system to be exposed to the environment(ever see the stuff floating around,when the sun comes in a window at a certain angle?),when there is a sealed alternative.Surely the probability exists that the belt on my old Cosmos lasted 12 years because it was not exposed to environmental contamination,as some non sealed systems do.I'm probably going a bit overboard here.Just food for thought.

Best regards.

I've had mine for 3+ years and have never looked back.Built like a tank and lets you hear what's in the grooves.You will be hard pressed to find performance as this for under 20k IMHO of course.

Hi Speedy and all, I'm curious as to why you think that moving the motor to a seperate subassembly makes it necessarily less effective. Most every table these days has decoupled the motor from the plinth. I do suppose it is dependant on what base the whole shebang is siting on. I like having a belt exposed. While I agree that it lends itself to gathering dust and debree I see this only an issue with the rubber belts. A string or milar tape should not be a problem. But even with a rubber belt a little Simple Green works wonders.

I do like the metal plinth, heavy platter and composite armboard. The vacuum hold down is also a major feature. I'm still waiting to hear from Sota on the dual arm possibility which is another major feature I'm looking for. I should have called them, but I'm not in that big of a hurry.

Dan,you must understand that this is all only my taste.Lots of stuff is viable.Though I can't see the ever so popular desire to have more than one arm,and cartridge.Unless one has an extensive mono collection,as well as stereo stuff,but that's JUST me!!

Hi Speedy. Yes I know that all of this is personal tastes and choices. I also know that you enjoy discussions on this audio stuff so I was just attempting to engage a bit. Your posts do get me thinking.

This dual arm thing started for me on my last table and I had a Vector and Graham 2.2 tonearms. I do listen to many kinds of music, classic rock, blues, jazz, some country and bluegrass, and from time to time, classical. I found that there was a very noticeable difference in sound when using the same cartridge on either arm with different types of music. Both were very good, but one combination would sound a little better in some way than the other. But I grew tired of spending 20-30 minutes swapping arms and there was no way to really dial in a step-up then remove and replace it and have it be the same. This is all probably due more to the engineer in me than the music lover. I'm trying to please my yen and yang at the same time.

The vacuum hold down is a feature I have just recently added to my list of desired features. I wasn't real impressed with the clamp on my last table, a little too susceptible to clamping pressure. I suspect the weight solution would be even more of a problem. Reading about Sota's vacuum sensing system sounds like it would be a very good alternative.

I'm still looking for my next table so I'll probably change my mind several times before settling on something.

Thanks,

Dan