Grand Prix Audio Monaco Turntable

Mtkhl,
Thanks for posting the review of the Grand Prix Monaco. HiFi+ will not be available in the US until May 2. I generally find RG's reviews to be fair and honest, but ocassionally wish that he would talk a little more about the interactions among various pieces of ancillary equipment, such as a power amp and the speaker under review, etc. In this case, he seems to have done a good job in that area. It would have been nice had he tried the Dynavector tonearm which is reputed to be a very good match for the table. Do you find that power cords and AC filtering have any impact on the sound of the TT?

Raul, I agree with you entirely. Now that you read the review, wouldn't it be
interesting to learn what that would sound like in your rig? Btw, for future
reference, at www.hifiplus.com you can buy an eMagazine version of any issue,
and other backissues.

Fcrowder, that is another beauty of this turntable the power from the wall is not
used to drive the platter! The power of a small battery would work too! It uses
5V DC and thus no influence from dirty power, no impact from power cords or
conditioning systems. I tried, Gutwire, Siltech, PS Audio, and no difference from
my stock $1.99 supermarket cord.

Dear Henry: Certainly I will do it sooner or latter and thank you again for the HiFi+ link.

Obviously there could be no same Monaco level performance but my SP-10MK2 ( with out plinth, very important subject. ) is doing things very well and in many ways better than my BD ones.

Anyway here through the Monaco design all of us have a " different very high quality performer new kid on the street " and this fact is a welcome one to all audio industry!!

Regards and enjoy the music.
Raul.

It is a pleasure to find this thread. In fact just few days ago I had never heard of Grand Prix Audio. I stumbled upon this turn table when I found out that this TT was used with all Zanden system at CES 2008. Then I read Hifi+ review by RG- a very well written and pretty thorough review, as always and find it real fascinating. I don't know if it is true or not but it was kind of embarrassing to find him uncover the fact that the Emperor (Typical high end analog sound) has no cloths!

Also glad to read that closest similar sound spectra is produced by the Clearaudio Master Ref Deck ( which I happen to own and love). I have lived with the Clearauido MR TT for more than a year and still amazed at the how transparent sound it reproduces. The sound is (MR) anything but lean. The bass is deep, tight and has plenty tonal colors rather than just sound warm , big and fluffy. High freq. extension also is there but nothing that stands out unless it is present in recording/note. Mids are 'big' and life like. Percussion notes are fast as well as well 'spread' (duration and substantial and enough mid/high freq content- don't know how else to describe. In other words there is no short high freq bursts but has some character that you can 'look' into. Closely mike triangles have distinct impact, body and reverb. The drum sticks sound substantial, present and woody I could go on and on))
In fact, occasionally I have wished for bass to be round and big but I know that real life acoustic bass has definition and varied tonal colors. On Electronic music, which I listen to a lot, the bass is practically earthshaking and I mean like 'center of earth bass'. I would call this sound anything but lean. I am not describing to toot my own horn but trying to get handle on well set up GPA's reproduced sound characteristics

If this sound characteristics is any indication then, GPA hifi+ sound report/review probably is right on mark. I have not read the MF report yet.

Only question is would anyone pay $20k plus for mere 40 pound puny looking TT which probably don't entitle you for any bragging rights- like say TWRaven or walker or even Clearaudio MR ;-)? (I am kidding of course. )

Okay, just read the Stereophile review also. Both review kind of indicate similar sounds signature (Top to bottom clarity) but at the same time could not be more similar based on Tone arm and cartridge choices. It is obvious that MF found the sound dry and etched based on his set up vs Roy found it right based on his set up. Who is correct? Probably both in the respective set up and systems tried.