Got a New CD Player and Now I'm Bummed

i have a clearaudio ambition cmb with a Lyra Helikon SL and has recently beaten the crap out of a friend's new digital rig: stereophile's digital product of the year, the 16000 dollar chord transport and 64 bit dac. Any good analogue setup can easily kill almost any digital frontend, with an exception of dCS's recent Scarlatti, which begins to approach analogue, but its not there yet...

I don't quite understand how you think "The table ....is immune from footfalls and airborne vibration generated by the speakers." Isolated from footfalls to a large extent but form speaker airborne vibes, now way. I have to agree with Restock that the cabinet maybe actually reinforcing low frequencies and then focusing them to the TT. If the TT was in an open situtaion the sound waves have less of a chance to be focused. Try a stethescope on the plinth or support shelf and see what your hear. You'll always have airborne vibes to contend with if your TT in in the same room as your speakers.
I would try adding a PH5. The improved phono performance btwn that and a SP16 is huge. The bass improvements alone are amazing. It's a really great sounding phonostage. I think adding a PH5 would be better than adding a LS25 simply because a good sep. phono will be better than a better preamp w/phono, not to knock a LS25.
Then a better cartridge. I think a mistake is thinking that a TT under $2K can't do a similairly priced cartridge justice. I have a friend with a HW19 MK3/RB300 I sold him my Benz Ruby2. Compared to the Denon MC and his ClearAudio MM there was no contest. Is he getting all from Ruby2 with his TT, probably not but his treble is to die for. If he added a PH5 it would sound amazing.

The ARC LS25 doesn't have a phonostage 'LS= Line Stage Only' and requires an external phonostage. I was just saying that the higher end LS26,LS26,Ref2 all provide superior soundstaging to the SP16 and LS16.. so both the CD player and phonostage would improve..

So ideally upgrading the Phonostage and Linestage would provide a huge improvement. Even the cheap Dynavector P75 Mk2 so you can use the enhanced mode for your current cart and upgrade later.

Dodgealum,

Here's my $.02...

I think the emphasis on your TT placement is misplaced. You took great pains to isolate it from both footfalls and directly radiated energy from the speakers. While some airborne energies may be trapped and resonating within the enclosure, there are other factors limiting your analog reproduction and in my estimation they are much greater.

You've acquired a truly high performance digital source. It gets the very best from the media it plays and is not susceptible to the distortions that are so difficult to reduce when playing vinyl. The Esoteric's sonic clarity is exposing the flaws of your analog equipment. This direct comparison has sensitized you to its distortions and non-linearities and now they bother you. (They don't bother many people, including the "my $500 rig will outplay any digital source" crowd.)

Some of the weaknesses in your analog front end were mentioned or alluded to by others, so apologies if I repeat anybody's advice or ideas.

1. The motor controller supplied by VPI with the Scout is notoriously inadequate. That's why they sell the SDS (as mentioned above). Without a good controller you have no hope of speed accuracy, and speed accuracy is job one for a TT.

2. The Scout is driven by a rubber band (in effect). No drive mechanism containing elastic torque couplings can maintain constant speed when faced with a variable load (ie, stylus drag). That is not an opinion, it's basic engineering. My platter weighs more than your entire TT. It has several times more rotational inertia than your platter. Yet if I switch to an elastic belt like yours my sonics go instantly downhill. Transients are dulled, dynamics are softened, bass is limp, mids and highs are smeared. All the tweaking in the world will not eliminate the flaws inherent in an elastic drive train.

3. Rubber(y) material in contact with a TT (especially the platter) is a sonic no-no. When an elastic material encounters vibrations (intra-platter resonances) it temporarily contracts (changes shape) to absorb the energy. Being elastic, however, it wants to return to its resting shape. When it does so it releases the stored energies back into the platter - shifted in time, frequency and amplitude. These vibrations reach the stylus through the record. Result: sonic mud.

4. Your tonearm, like any unstabilized unipivot, is incapable of fully performing a tonearm's primary job: holding the cartridge squarely over the center of the groove. It relies on the reaction to groovewall pressures to maintain azimuth stability. This puts undue pressure on the cartridge suspension. Result: reduced dynamics, slowed pace, a serious decrease in both low level detail and HF extension. Since the entire arm/cartridge responds to unequal sidewall pressures by making reactive microscopic azimuth changes, crosstalk is increased and always varying. Result: bloated images and poor L/R soundstaging.

I could go on but you get my drift: your present TT and arm have inherent weaknesses and your new digital rig has exposed them. That doesn't mean you can't enjoy them, but you shouldn't expect them to outplay a top class source. That just isn't going to happen - and it's all your fault for buying such a nice digital spinner! ;-)

My guess is you'll have to spend about $5-7K for a TT and arm that will reduce distortions and non-linearities enough to roughly match the Esoteric (note: none of the choices you listed addresses the problems I mentioned). You could spend a lot more to really beat the Esoteric if you choose. Whether you should is up to you of course.

Doug:

Thanks for your thoughtful and well reasoned response. I think you are right on the mark. I feel that while the Scout may be a good table at it's price point it simply cannot compete with a top shelf digital player like the Esoteric, no matter how it is situated. I do think that the responses here suggest a real reluctance on the part of the audiophile community to recognize the gains that have been made in digital playback. It seems most people focused their comments on what must be wrong with my LP setup--otherwise, how could it possibly be bested by a CD player? Again, I've been drinking that Kool Aid for a long while myself. When I got my Naim CDX2 it was an eye opener. In some respects it surpassed my Scout in performance, though overall I'd rate them equally capable components. The Esoteric has moved things to a whole other level, to the point where I am not convinced that any upgrade to the Scout will allow it to compete. This is why I started this thread--to get some opinions on another analogue setup that will work in my situation and will provide performance at (or above) the level of my digital front end. Doug--you have indicated that none of the tables I mentioned will do this--do you have any others in mind that will? Once I upgrade the table I can look at changes to my preamp and phonostage that will allow me to take full advantage of my vinyl rig.