A Copernican View of the Turntable System

Dear Halcro: To your first question IMHO not only a budget analog rig can't beats a digital source ( DVD-A ) but even top analog rig can't do it so " easily ".
Digital source IMHO is approaching the begin of " maturity " time where even this technology can tell you if your system is " right or wrong " somewhere.

On your other question I think that a top analog rig can't approach the sound coming from a master tape. Both mediums are way different and IMHO I think that we can enjoy both.
I heard several times RTR tapes and till today " I'm not crazy about ", maybe because I'm equalized to the LPs performance kind of sound or maybe because I was not " exposed " to much time to that medium or maybe because I don't care seriously about.

Now, the digital source and the RTR " technology " is way way beter mediums to reproduce music than our beloved analog one ( LPs. ) that is so imperfect that I can't understand, today, why we like it so much ( other that we own thousands of LPs. ) when the " medium " has so many inaccuracies/distortions/noise.

Regards and enjoy the music,
Raul.

Regards, Dover: You wrote: "There should be no cantilever suspension".

Please reconsider, a Motionless Electromagnetic Generator (MEG) would violate the first law of thermodynamics. One able to overcome this small obstacle will recieve Princes as supplicants.

Henry, please excuse this diversion from your OP.

Peace,

Dear Halcro, the turntable, arm and cartridge do form ONE mechanical system. Tonearm and cartridge do form another mechanic-dynamic system of their own. There are wanted and ( more common ...;-) ...) some unwanted side-effects and synergies when putting the two "systems" together to get a record player.
The "plinth" and the "platter" do contribute (or detract ...) much more to the "sound" then most designers and audiophiles believe.
A full force vector diagram of the complete tt w/tonearm and cartridge and spinning platter (and building resonance ...) will nicely illustrate the interactions.
Cheers,
D.

DT, I was joking of course. This discourse was getting entirely too serious. For any one of us to elevate it to the level of the concepts brought forth by Copernicus or Galileo is ludicrous. Socrates, maybe....

Dear Henry, your remark above to Thuchan re the SX8000 is in contradistinction to your original theory in all its specifics, as is the SX8000 itself. The SX8000 and the lesser M-S tts in its family, all use massively heavy plinths and an iron grip (literally) between the tonearm mount/tonearm and the chassis. I agree with it. But "motor separated from plinth/platter" leaves us only with belt-drive turntables. I thought you were enjoying your Victor.

DT, I was joking of course. This discourse was getting entirely too serious. For any one of us to elevate it to the level of the concepts brought forth by Copernicus or Galileo is ludicrous. Socrates, maybe....

Dear Dertonarm,
No......Galileo didn't have a happy life with the Pope in Rome, but his book gave him immortality.
I saw you as the perfect candidate as Galileo in this case with your new turntable almost perfected?
And then with Raul's new tonearm, we will all only have to worry about which cartridges to play with? :-)
Cheers
Henry

Dear Raul,
I think you and I are in agreement on these things.
In terms of the compromises inherent at every step of the analogue system, it is still possible for even a budget turntable/arm/cartridge combination to easily outdo digital reproduction and with the best analogue reproduction, it is possible to approach the sound of master tapes?
So those compromises must be very small and easily overcome for this to be?
Regards
Henry

Dear Thuchan,
Yes, Micro Seiki knew a thing or two about analogue.
Your SX 8000 had it's motor separated from the plinth/platter and, as you say, the very solid arm boards attached rigidly to the plinth.
This is an example of an understandable use of a plinth........not designed to change the sound of the information extracted from the grooves, but to support the platter bearing and tonearms.
Sort of copied by TW Raven among others? :-)

Thanks for your thoughts Syntax.
Cheers
Henry

Come on Lewm, Copernicus certainly was no twit. If still bounded in certain ways of thinking - and as such deeply routed in its time and spirit - he was nevertheless a mind able to think past the frontiers of his day.
I will rather give my comment regarding turntable concept in physical form this summer.

Dear Halcro, it didn't worked out really good for Galileo giving his thoughts and comments to the world .....

Cheers,
D.

Copernicus was a twit anyway.

Dear Halcro: I see.

+++++ " I am claiming that without the precondition of the immovable and isolated tonearm BASE, any tonearm/cartridge combination will be compromised to some degree. " ++++++

well over the time at least five times I claimed the importance and influence of the arm board in a cartridge quality performance. I did not claim exactly what you are doing.

Now, there are some different subjects on your statement and I will try to comment by separate:

++++ will be compromised to some degree. +++++

IMHO from the very first moment that we mount a cartridge in a tonearm headshell exist a compromise between ( at least ) the cartridge body resonance point against the headshell kind of build material that has its own resonances.
From this very first stage all what happen between the cartridge, tonearm and TT is full of compromises including our each one skills to overall cartridge/tonearm set up even room temperature is a " compromise " on cartridge quality performance level.
Certainly the arm board link is an additional compromise with its own trade-offs.

Isolated BASE: well this IMHO is a TT manufacturer responsability where the tonearm manufacturers has to deal with.
In this regard I'm a proposal of stand alone arb board towers for at least all the TT resonances can't transmit through the arm board or if the TT manufacturer prefer the arm board integrated then that will be isolated from the TT it self.
In either way the TT manufacturer has to take care that the arm board be self isolated someway for the UNIT can't be disturbed by this audio link.
As other subjects/factors in audio this arm board base isolation always is desired but till today never achieved.

In the mean time IMHO the best a tonearm manufacturer can do is try to isolate the tonearm it self from the arm board.

Problem with this thread subject is that normally the TT manufacturer is different from the tonearm one and IMHO even if both were the same each manufacturar/designer thinks and fix his priorities in a different way with different targets.

Other aspect on all these is that the cartridge quality performance level on playback is surrounded by a lot of different an important factors where the arm board is only one more. Where can we put on importance level the arm board base subject? , this could be very subjective because we have to rank all the factors that have any influence in the cartridge performance and determine the precise " weight " each factor contribute against cartridge quality performance playback level.

I don't know for sure where you want to arrive with this subject and the only thing I can tell you is that some one has to take care about with more care that the one used too.

Regards and enjoy the music,
Raul.

Turntable chassis, motor drive (idler, direct, belt), bearing, platter, armboard, tonearm, headshell and cartridge make an analogue playback system - they are a unity and do influence each other. Looking on separated or single parts or combinations of parts will not help in the end to improve the overall capability of the system.

Maybe the importance of different plinth designs was a little overrated in recent developments using idlers or DDs and putting them into plinths of slate, special wood or other material. Many TT-designers did a good living by doing so. I do understand that audiophiles are getting a little tired of the plinth approach and switch to the other extreme. Focusing mainly on
tonearms and cartridges might be another misleading direction. Indeed we should concentrate on geometry, isolation where needed, careful installation and the quality and flexibility of armboards used.

Micro Seiki uses armboards made of brass which are very rigid and do enable the user to match all requirements in terms of geometry. Other brands of today have copied this philosophy - this is fine! But how many audiophiles are stuck in geometry problems when it comes to mounting a new tonearm. Sometimes one has has to build or order extra armboards
which are insufficiant.

A system should stay stable, free floating armboards bear risks of instable condition, especially when they are not real heavy weights or not placed on a special position on a special platform.

Interesting views.
Most think, that a Turntable, no matter which one, is a perfect unit and every manufacturer has enough knowledge to make it in a way, that it can't be improved. That is a master mistake.
The combination cartridge/Tonearm is hugely overrated, more or less the calculation (resonance) is a waste of time today, different Arm Tube materials, also because there are features, which are much more important for reproduction (Bearing quality, Geometry, energy transfer, ability to guide a cartridge, absence of ringing....)
The Armboard is a really interesting kind of view, Never discussed before. And very important. The best Arm can't show its abilities when the resonances from the Turntable are reflected in it. Same the other way from cartridge.
Or both sides are added and the search of the right cartridge will never end :-).

"The tonearm is now the centre of this ‘Turntable System’ and is the most important element. It must be rigidly held on a base which is perfectly flat, non-magnetic and relatively immune to structure-borne and air-borne feedback. This base must ideally have no contact with mechanical or electrical interference and must under no circumstances, move or deflect in any manner.
This base should ideally have no contact with the drive mechanism of the platter or the plinth, sub-platter, belt, gears, idler-wheels etc.
This base should be an island."

What a vacuous discussion. Suggest if you believe this, then sell your turntable, motor and records and just listen to your arm.

Your statements above contradict themselves - for ultimate speed speed stability there must be no movement between the drive and the platter. For ultimate generation of music from the interaction of the stylus on the record, then there must be no movement between the arm mounting and platter.

Ergo the motor drive, platter, arm and cartridge must be coupled together in a closed loop system that is absolutely rigid and yet has no transfer of unwanted energy between them that smears the speed sound or whatever.

In fact there should be no cantilever suspension to ensure as much transfer of the signal as possible - much like a rally car where they remove all the rubber mounts in for the engine, gearbox, drive etc to maximise power to the ground.

Dear Raul,
You are certainly correct that you have constantly been claiming that the tonearm/cartridge UNIT is the 'King' and most important part of the record-playing system.
But that is NOT what I am claiming.
My belief is that it is the BASE for the tonearm/cartridge unit which is the 'sine qua non' of the turntable system.

Once you have an immovable and isolated base, you may put whatever tonearm/cartridge combination you wish upon it?
MANY tonearms will sound well with a multitude of cartridges and I don't believe there is a single 'BEST' tonearm nor cartridge for all occasions?

I am claiming that without the precondition of the immovable and isolated tonearm BASE, any tonearm/cartridge combination will be compromised to some degree.
Of course there are many examples of non-isolated tonearm bases which work perfectly well but do so, I think, because they approach very closely, the characteristics of the isolated immovable base?

Your thoughts, as always, are appreciated.
Regards
Henry

Dear Lew,
My thesis is that once the immovable and isolated base has been established for the tonearm, the method of drive for the turntable will make no difference to the sound retrieved by the cartridge as long as perfectly correct and stable speed is achieved without any resonances transmitted via the platter.

If this is the case and I am correct (two big 'ifs'), any 'plinth' is superfluous?
If an added plinth around the turntable alters the sound in any way, then it cannot be correct.
It may be preferred by certain listeners but must by definition, be a tone control either adding or subtracting information.
As Atmasphere correctly said about outboard phono stages.......if a change of interconnects changes the sound, the phono stage is flawed.

Thanks Hodu,
After the initial thread was started (with the link to my system's page), I was then able to post the long statement on this thread.
I wrote to Audiogon but have received no answer as to why this might be?

Dear Halcro: When I " arrived " to this forum ( 6-7 years ago ) I posted several times the main and critical importance that the tonearm/cartridge had in an analog playback system and several times too from everyone I received the same answer: wrong the more important link is the TT.

Over the years and through my ( and other ones. ) " insistence " on the subject today almost all agree on the main importance of the tonearm /cartridge in that analog system.

You can see/read that I'm not speaking on tonearm alone but in tonearm/cartridge as a UNIT.

Then for me the centre of an analog system is not the tonearm but the cartridge/tonearm UNIT that between other things represent the source that IMHO is the more important ( the source ) audio link in any audio system: the centre of an audio system.

The source is IMHO the " King " in an audio system chain where all the other audio links ( including our each one skills for right system overall set up. ) are " only " subjects/slaves at King's service.

Regards and enjoy the music,
Raul.

Ummm.... First you posit a "new" way of looking at the interaction of cartridge, tonearm, and turntable which I think is leading to a defense of outboard tonearm pods. But at the last second, you swerve away from that issue and seem to posit that your Copernican view of the LP playback system somehow leads to the conclusion that a plinth is superfluous. As Archimedes might have said to his plumber, "It does not hold water".

As I have said before, the plinth issue and the arm pod issue are two entirely separate ones, except whereas the lack of a plinth makes it easy for you to get a bunch of tonearm pods nearer to the platter, so they can all be aligned properly. I don't think there is any argument that can lead to the universal conclusion that a plinth is never a good idea or never leads to a perceived improvement in LP reproduction. It is even conceivable that a good plinth can be more than just transparent; it can make the turntable (idler or direct drive) sound "better" than it does with no plinth. (Before I abandoned the belt-drive notion, I had come to the conclusion that for belt-drive, a big heavy plinth was superfluous and usually not a good thing. Most of the top end modern belt-drive tts seem to be built in accordance with that idea.)

I do think there are good arguments as regards independent tonearm pods, pro and con. I have stated my argument against them elsewhere, more than once. Here you have an interesting argument for.

Interesting thoughts. First, though, a question: How did you end up getting the long post accepted after first having had it rejected?

For thousands of years it was believed that the earth was the centre of the solar system and that the sun revolved around it.
Before telescopes existed, Copernicus proposed that it was the earth in fact, that revolved around the sun.

For longer than I can remember, it was generally accepted that the turntable (plinth/platter) was the centre of the analogue playback system with the arm and cartridge attendant to it?

I propose that it is the arm…..or rather the cartridge that is in fact the centre of the turntable system with the platter required simply to drive the record onto the stylus.

Together with the belief that the platter is the centre of the ‘Turntable System’ is the belief that the stylus ‘tracks’ the groove in the vinyl in a passive subservient manner?
I propose that it is the platter which drives the vinyl groove onto the stylus which is being held rigidly by the tonearm.

Imagine if you will in a perfect world, a cartridge held in a vice-like grip and a mile-long, perfectly straight vinyl groove being fed at precisely the right speed past the stylus?
All that would be required for the cartridge to transmit perfect information, is the ability to move up and down frictionlessly to allow for warpage as the groove modulates?
Now this ‘straight’ vinyl groove is in fact a ‘spiral’ so that the cartridge must have the ability to adjust its position laterally also in a frictionless manner.
That is the purpose of the tonearm……to hold the cartridge rigidly yet allow it to move up and down and sideways as the vinyl groove is rammed onto the stylus at a perfectly maintained constant speed.

The tonearm is now the centre of this ‘Turntable System’ and is the most important element. It must be rigidly held on a base which is perfectly flat, non-magnetic and relatively immune to structure-borne and air-borne feedback. This base must ideally have no contact with mechanical or electrical interference and must under no circumstances, move or deflect in any manner.
This base should ideally have no contact with the drive mechanism of the platter or the plinth, sub-platter, belt, gears, idler-wheels etc.
This base should be an island.

The ‘turntable’ or platter is simply a revolving mechanism positioned at a certain geometrical distance from the centre of the tonearm, whose method of drive has absolutely no impact on the sound of the ‘system’ so long as it maintains perfect speed control and perfect isolation to the record from air-borne and structure-borne feedback.

The idea therefore of a plinth around the platter in the above scenario, would only serve to add or subtract information in a worst-case scenario, or be totally transparent in a best-case situation.

There……I’ve said it.
Is there a 'Galileo' out there to support me before I die unrecognised? :-(