Is the Teres a

I'm always in favor of hearing a "shootout" of some great tables.

I still love my Teres 245.
I know it isn't "the best", even in the Teres lineup alone, but it sounds great to me, and I could afford it.

I think that achieving a sound that you enjoy is the important thing, and not chasing your tail for "the best", which is very subjective anyway.

It will be alot of fun doing the shootout, though. Maybe I can get out there and hear them for myself.

"Maybe I can get out there and hear them for myself."

That's a great excuse to take out the *mature* waitress for a spin on the BMW 'cycle...

Forget about "correct" PRaT, and just concentrate on whether or not any PRaT is there. Humans react to rhythm in a way no machine will ever do (and consequently will never be reliably measured), as we are tapped into the rhythms which are found in nature all around us, such as our own regulated heartbeats. PRaT is what makes you want to dance, or nod your head, or tap your feet, or wave your arms: it is biological and this is why it is distrusted by many, who feel a need to have everything measurable by scientific equipment before they trust it. Of course, after our biological response has identified relative levels of PRaT which scientific equipment fails to detect, we can then devise or further develop the instruments which will more reliably indicate its existence or non-existence in playback equipment. Only a truly awful musical ensemble of any sort will fail to get the rhythm, and the equipment which fails to retrieve it from a recording is, quite simply, a failure. Of course, PRaT can be retrieved in varying degrees (or lost in varying degrees), and the equipment which makes arm-waving, head-nodding and foot-tapping an IMPERATIVE (assuming a system capable of transmitting this), is therefore at the top of the pile in this very fundamental aspect of music reproduction. Music, after all, is in very large part a biological and emotional experience, as well as intellectual. We have to place our reactions to music ahead of our scientific analyses.

Now, back to my IMPERATIVE Lenco! ;-)

Like I said before:

The better my system sounds the more *physical* it gets. You can have an expensive system that is ultra quiet, ultra detailed, with good imaging yet Laks "boogie factor".

"...maintaining as perfect-as-possible speed stability in the face of stylus drag (the Great Enemy) is the way to preserve the PRaT of the original performance."

My point exactly Jean, and this is why I had a problem with the PRaT comment NGeorge quoted from Art Dudley's review. How could an LP12 resist stylus drag better than a Quattro Supreme? That just seems so unlikely...

BTW, what instruments/voices do you guys find to be most vulnerable to stylus drag? For me it's massed violins, but I'm curious what other musical sounds you've noticed that need "perfect" speed stability to sound acceptably realistic.