Is it worth this tonearm?

Mariasplunge

a doshi pre - yes you are really doing this right
as others stated - you'll be tuning in the vta on the triplanar with great results
(our honorable doug has a nice writeup on this)

I'm three days away from doing that myself
I've had my triplanar and universe since january
the universe is on a nottingham arm spacedeck table
Thom Mackris has had my arm for fitting for a few weeks
and the table arrives this week

if you don't have a viable record cleaner
by all means buy a loricraft
it will help you extract all that magic
and keep your records pristine

welcome to the world of high end analog

Hi Dan- Yeah the M2 is quite a step up; the music just flows. Still need to make some minor tweaks to deal with occasional mistracking on highs. For its price the Silver is a real over-achiever, but I also think the M2 falls into the same category. It was/is a bit finicky/scary to set up w/o an arm rest of fingerlift (ask Doug, he did the heavy lifting; I did the worrying.) I'm glad the ZYX does not have a nude cantiliver like my Benz did. That would be beyond scary.

Audiotomb,
Look forward to a report when your table arrives. Which did you get? it has been interesting to me to note how different tables sound. Including the high-mass vs. suspension tables. It still amazes me that tables actually will sound different. I geuss I am still use to CDP's where the sound is noticably different.
Swampwalker, thanks for your vote of confidence. I looked up your system recently. Very nice. I like what your going after. The VAC was second on my list for a pre. If I had had the funds then, I would have purchased that used one that came up a little while ago. How do you like it. From the description you gave, I am assuming very much. And fine point about the dedicated tonearm cable. Does the Schroeder work on the same principle?
I've never heard of lorcraft rcord cleaners. I just assumed VPI was the way to go. Can you tell me some more audiotomb. How oftern do you clean your records? Whats the process like? Which cleaning fliud do you use? That part of the vinyl world is still a mystery to me!

Cheers,
Peter

Peter,

Good move on the tonearm. If you haven't already, search for the thread titled "TriPlanar Tips". There are many fine-tuning tweaks and even one or two safe usage tips that aren't mentioned in the manual. Most of them are discussed there. The TriPlanar page on Thom Mackris' web site is also very helpful.

Don't let the TriP's in-your-face complexity put you off playing around with all the adjustments. However much or little your ears decide to make use of them, you'll be more comfortable with the arm if you're confident of how everything works. Having all those doo-dads visible and touchable actually makes it easier.

Sonic differences between tables? Oh yes. Often more so than between tonearms IME.

I'll strongly second Audiotomb's recommendation of the Loricraft RCM. It's been discussed many times here and on Vinyl Asylum, there's really no comparison with a VPI or any similar machine. The Loricraft (and one or two others) employ an entirely different method for applying vacuum to the record surface. It's much quieter, provides a stronger vacuum, produces less static buildup and eliminates cross-contamination via the vacuum wand and felts - because it doesn't have any. It's expensive, naturally, but I wouldn't trade mine away.

Once a record is truly clean, there should be no need to wet clean it again. A simple dry brush before/after each side should suffice. The trick, however, is getting it truly clean with NOTHING left behind. There've been some excellent threads here by Justin Time discussing the challenges of achieving that.

We're in the midst of trying some new cleaning fluids. Our previous standard is being challenged by the new formulas recently introduced by AIVS. In our tests so far, going on two weeks, Jim Pendleton's formulations are doing a better job in a couple of areas. I'll post separately when we're done testing different combos, but so far we're pretty happy.

Swampwalker's system provides an integrated, you-are-there sensation for the music he listens to that's really satisfying. Paul and I both have pretty high sensitivities to certain artficial flavors and colors. His setup has none of those. It might not do large scale classical or big rock quite as convincingly, but for his music it performs beautifully. I could listen to it for hours and hours, and I did!

Peter- I have had my VAC in Doug's system and as you can tell, he has listened to it at my place. Without having done any detailed long term comparison, I would say that the differences between it and the Doshi are small. The MC stage on the Doshi is an active gain stage; the VAC is a transformer stage. The implementation is quite good, but I happen to have an active pre-pre built by ZYX that is optomized for their carts and have never popped the hood on the VAC to optomize cart loading. So of course, the VAC with the SUT stage is not quite up to the Doshi, but very close. The VAC with the ZYX pre-pre is really quite outstanding, IMO. And yes, the Schroeder has integrated one piece phono leads. I think that this is a big advantage and perhaps partly explains the v. good performance of the M2 and the OL Silver in their price classes. Of course I have never been able to test this theory but as I said, given the VERY SMALL signals we are talking about with an LO MC (0.25 mv, about 1/1000th of line stage voltages). If any tone arm maker wants to help us out here with a pair of identical arms, one with integrated headshell to RCA leads, and another with a DIN connection, I would be happy to volunteer my home for a listening test ;~).