How Much Is TOO MUCH for a Analog front End?

Regarding the rim drive for the VPI. I spoke to Harry about it and he said that it is a significant upgrade that is realitively cheap to add to the current Scoutmasters. The kit includes a new flywheel which has the drive wheel attached. The motors have to be reversed which means they have to come out of the assembly, and 2 wires have to be transposed. He said the sound of the lower mids and bass is much improved (he said had the power and extensions of the best CD), whereas the highs are retained as vinyl. The upgrade he suspects will be about a year in coming (I spoke to him on the last days of 07 - did he mean in a week in 08).

You say your table is on brass cones and a stone shelf. That would seems to be a poor choice. Brass cones impart a "brassy" sound to whatever I tried, and a stone slab should just aggrivate that resonance. In truth, you simply cant rid yourself of resonances, but you can move them to a place that doesnt effect the sound. I have my Superscout on a Gingko platform which seems to do what I want. You might touch base with their website and/or speak to them. They are very nice and helpful. I have my conponents on a 1 inch slab of medical grade Ultam which I cut for each component..expensive, but the best shelf I've heard. Even then I have the components off of their own feet and on something called Pon-Tunes. These are similar to Rollerballs and I am satisfied.

I think if you have to save for 6 to 9 months to buy
the next upgrade, it's really not that big a deal. 6 to 9 months from now, you still won't have extra money, you'll still be 6 to 9 months older, but you'll have a better analog rig! And you'll have something to obsess about in the mean time- if we weren't all relatively obsessive, we wouldn't be reading about the gear on a forum
when we're not listening to the music and equipment. Of course, there's audiophiles who do computer stuff while they're listening, but I digress.

Go for it. Your friends and family will be glad you finally get it because they'll be tired of hearing about it (a trick I learned from one buddy dealing with his wife).

Good luck on the decision,
RFG

GUMBY
I'm still laughing,,that is a good trick, but I was gonna siphon off just enough cash from "our"(my wife and I) budget to fund this little project, You are right I am obsessing over this table. I know myself I will not come to a happy medium til I get this set up.

Stringbeen I will look into that.

New question: seeing as how I have to live with this current set up for the next 9 months I need to get the most out of it.
I know there is a thread for it but,regarding the TWL tonearm tweak, I have the weights , drilled them out but cant for the life of me figure out how to mount them. I drilled them out so they're almost identical in weight, and cannot find the right inner diameter drill bit so that they "press fit " over my Ol silver's mounting yoke. and if thats not bad enough I can't find the right adhesive to make them "stick"
any help would be greatly appreciated.
pics and all!!
btw I AM GETTING THE NEW TABLE!!
I jsut haven't figured out which one......
til then thanks all

I'm glad you decided to
go for it!

I have a little story to
share about the importace
of a good table.

I sold some raw drivers to a gentleman who insisted I listen to his system in his wreckroom
downstairs.

He had three turntables, but the one that took your eye as soon as you
entered the room was a table that had a ten inch thick electric blue platter. it had the same blue color motor
which was far from the table that ran a long belt. Very beautiful/ exotic !

He proceded to play some
records on the lessor tables that had the same cartridge.

sounded good but he told me that the bigass rig
sounded about 4 or 5 times better.

I said noway!
Not with the same cartridge and simual arms.

When we twek steros we
look for 10 or 20 % differences.

I've never heard of a 4
or 5 times improvment!

So here we go, he drops the needle and instintly
ny jaw dropped to the ground.

I would never believed
how much of a difference
a table could make!

the table he bought cost him $20,000.00 the arms were nothing special just
black 9'' pivot arms that
cost $1000.00 to $1500.00. Cartriges were all the same micro rubies@ $3000.00 ea.

So there you have it, my
shocking experience with
gorgeous kickass table.

After about 10 months wait I finally recieved
my schroder arm.

It's gorgious and very easy on the eyes and always a pleasure to handle.
Now if only my magenetic bearig table would get here I will forever have a smile/grin that cannot be removed!