Beginner's Technics SL-1200 questions


I've decided to take my Thorens TD-160 offline for a bit while I work on the common mods that are well documented online. In the meantime, I ordered a Technics SL-1200. This is one of the STOKYO refurbished-in-Japan decks- hopefully I'll report on the quality of that when I get it.

1. The turntable is shipping without any sort of mat. Searching on line, I see a lot of references to layering of mats, and different thickness. Rubber and other materials. What do I need to get to have the 'standard configuration'? The items available at KAB seemed to need to be mated with an "Isoplatman"?

2. I ordered the standard headshell and an AT440MLa cartridge. In addition to the overhang tool, what other tools will I need to set this cart up correctly?

Thanks for following along with these very basic questions.
adnan
Adnan - hope you enjoy your TT. I've got an SL1210M5G purchased from KAB Electro Acoustics back in 2007. The fluid damper is definitely worth it. It's a small trough to which you will add a viscous silicone fluid. A small "paddle" from the tone arm contacts the fluid. The viscosity of the fluid helps dampen tone arm movement. If you overfill the trough, you can definitely have too much of a good thing (too much of the paddle will be in contact with the fluid) resulting in over-damping. In my set up I've only a few millimeters of paddle actually penetrating the surface of the silicone when the stylus is playing a record. Good luck getting things sorted out.
Is the goal of isolation under the feet only for foot steps and effects of bass?
No. As Johnnyb53 explained just above:
The stock footers on the Technics are not very good. In spite of their serious look, they don't isolate well from room vibration nor do they drain internal vibrations from the turntable.
Both goals are important, though different.

Isolation from structure-borne vibrations prevents mistracking/skipping and lowers the system sound floor. As such vibrations tend to be at fairly low frequencies, reducing them reduces the LF mud that gets into the system, which reduces the work for every component in the signal path. The sonic result is blacker backgrounds and the ability to hear lower levels of detail.

Draining vibrations that are already in the rig (motor vibrations and stray energies escaping from the cartridge) has a similar effect, but as such noises can occur at many frequencies, their effects, if not drained away, are more complex. But they're always noise, so less is better.

Improving bass and dynamic response requires that the turntable be as immobile as possible. The turntables which produce the lowest, tightest, strongest bass and punchiest dynamics are high mass designs. Suspended and lightweight tables allow the tail to wag the dog, so to speak. To whatever extent this occurs, dynamics and bass response will suffer. My TT weighs nearly 90 lbs. It has better dynamics and bass than any light/suspended table. But even this fairly heavy table suffers weakened bass and dynamics if I put overly compliant footers beneath it.

From the above, you could correctly deduce that isolating from external vibrations while maintaining maximum bass and dynamics are somewhat conflicting goals. This makes finding an optimal support solution for any particular turntable/tonearm/cartridge a matter of experimentation and sometimes luck.

I can only add some info to Johnnyb53 post that another great solution is Isonoe feets (isonoe.com). That is what i use for my two technics 1210 (in the second system). Fluid damper from Kevin (KAB is also great. Kevin is a great guy, so you can ask him. Check for AudioTechnica Technihard headshells (they are great and fully adjustable for overhand and azymuch). Orsonic headshell is another good option. You have to rewire internal tonearm cable and external rca cable with cardas or better one to improve the sound. Later you may replace the tonearm to SME or Jelco or Audiomods depends what cartridges you want to use.