2. analog
  3. 1186241649

Analog playback issues

The other week my mom got out some of her records she had not played for several years. When she put one on it sounded garbled(like when you plug a cd player into the phono pre-amp on a receiver) the turntable is a technics sl dd24 from the mid or late 70's, and she assumed that it was just time to replace it with some budget table from Sony. When she set the new table up the same result occurred and she wound up returning the item. I'm fairly certain she had both the old and new turntable set up correctly. What could be the issue? Component info: Onkyo TX-8511 receiver, Technics sl dd24, Cartridge Technics P338
jmoog08
musicslug
430 posts
 
if two entirely different TTs end up having identical malfunctions, it's pretty likely the receiver is the issue.
dan_ed
2,451 posts
 
Does the receiver have phono inputs? If not, that's the problem.
mlsstl
1,473 posts
 
Sounds like a phono preamp problem.

One thing you might try is getting some spray contact cleaner. Turn off the receiver and unplug it. Remove the top case of the receiver and spray the cleaner on the selector switch (the switch that changes between tuner, phone, tape, aux input.) Rotate the switch knob back and forth for a couple minutes. It could be that crud or corrosion was affecting the phono input. Since moving magnet cartridges run at a much lower voltage than tuner/tape/aux lines it would be more susceptible to this issue.

If that doesn't fix the problem (and your aux input is still good) get an outboard phono preamp. These start as low as $25 or $30 at Radio Shack and the quality really isn't too bad. Obviously you can spend a lot more if you wish.
More to discover