A $300-$400 turntable tweak

As with Doak up above, I seriously question the use of clamps and weights (never tried an outer ring and don't plan to). I used a VPI clamp on my TNT for years and one day tried one of those silly looking Ringmats without the clamp. I've abandoned the Ringmat but never went back to the clamp except now and then I'll try one just to confirm that I was right :-)

And playing records now is SO much simpler.

Hmmm.....interesting about centre clamps?
I lived happily without one for 25 years on a Rega Planar 3 but have since tried one on both my turntables (Raven AC-3 and Victor TT-81).
Whilst I cannot detect with any confidence any benefits to the centre clamp on these two decks, I also cannot hear any detriment?
What to do....what to do??

What is difficult to know is the clamp changing the sound because of the 'clamping' or is something else going on.
The way I see it, a peripheral clamp is going to very difficult(impossible??) to centre PERFECTLY, even if machined with a particular tt platter in mind. If not centred perfectly you will end up having an eccentric mass around the outside of the platter which would have to have some effect on speed stability.
So is what we're hearing really due to the clamping effect at all?

Lespier, the peripheral ring I'm familiar with (a friend uses it) came with a mounting jig that centers the ring perfectly and then is removed before playing.

I was just over at someones place for a listen who uses a ring, places the plastic template to assist to align etc.

Also uses a centre clamp and has a mat.

While listening, in converstion I asked if I could hear his set-up with out the ring, mat and record clamp, I first got a quick look. The look was like are you ... but he was willing.

Was not willing to remove the mat in question though because he said he would then have to make adjustments to the arm height for the allowance difference which I understood.

So now that pce of music is done and I was asked what would I like to listen to, I said the same cut.

He said NO NO that he would not do that, I then listened to his reasoning for this.

I really wanted to hear the same record cut again during this process but he just would not do it.

I'm a bit confused, can someone shed some light here or is this going to be another debate?

He waits 24hours before playing because of .... I guess who ever agrees with this knows his reasoning.

Isn't this whole topic just a mith? I play mine over again otherwise how and the heck am I going to really identify the differences in what I'm hearing or am I incorrect and actually hearing the record it's self sonically changing.

We actually got into a bit of a debate because of this. I said if you don't listen to the same cut again and wait to listen say 24 hrs down the road how do you really know what's going on, to really identify the over all sonic diffferences how does one then have a acurate refference point.

I said too many other factors come into play.

I'm curious how do you do your comparisons.

If you play a record and play the same cut over do you notice sonic differences, if so what.