Alex: What is a 1210 as opposed to a 1200? And are we to assume that you got yours from KAB, replete with the fluid damper and outboard supply? [FYI: Mine is an early-80's 1200MKII (bought new at that time), to which I have added Kevin's mods, plus a Michell record clamp, Sorbothane mat (now in conjunction with a Technics thin rubber mat underneath it), Music Direct tonearm wrap, and placed atop a Symposium shelf resting on FoculPods Sorbothane pucks. It's presently got a B-M Glider M2 installed, and my perpetual 'next' upgrade is supposed to be installing better RCA jacks on the lead-out wires...]
Gurevise: Your question is the one that I wish I could answer but can't. Mr. Yakovlev has much more experience than I with other TT designs - I've had the same 1200 since I left college and nothing else (I've heard others, but not in my system or with the same carts I've had). My guess is that with the KAB and other mods mentioned above added, the basic design goodness of the 1200 should make it many ways competitive or superior to most belt-drive options in its moderate price range (my one major reservation about the design is that the aluminum platter's inherent resonance is not completely damped compared to most audiophile designs, although doubling-up on the mats as outlined above helps). It sounds good enough to me that I haven't felt the need to replace it (only tweaked it) during the period of time in which every other component in my system has been upgraded an average of twice, but this is not the same endorsement as if I were to verify my impressions by in-home auditioning some of the competition. Unfortunately, for me that seems too much of a hassle and expense when I'm already happy, so I can only wonder... |
A.Y. - Since you're obviously much more zealous and technically knowledgeable about this TT stuff than I am, I'm curious about your opinion of a few things regarding the 1200. Since you chose this platform to work with, I'm assuming that what you find indispensible are primarily the 1200's speed-control system and cast-aluminum plinth. What I want to know is, how would you rate your Rega replacement 'arm against the 1200's integral 'arm (especially with the KAB fluid damper added)? What is your opinion of the TT main bearing quality? How are you mechanically isolating your 'table? And do you, like me, have any issues with the platter damping, and if so, what approach do you or will you take for this? |
The internal 'arm wiring does seem like a logical area to address, but maybe a difficult one, and I'm not sure how to go about it. I agree that the lead-out cabling is not great: Aside from the noisy molded-on jacks, I'm having occasional problems with AM radio pick-up at my current house, and playing with the wires seems to have an effect on its intensity. (Unfortunately, I'm also using a 'nude' cart - no shielding from a metal body - and I know from experimentation that this is also a contributing factor. The good news it doesn't occur but a small minority of the time, and is quite low in level.) The idea I'm toying with is to just cut off the stock wires very short and terminate them in female jacks, making the TT lead-outs into a sort of 'pig-tail' arrangement, and then use a set of appropriate 1/2 meter interconnects to get the signal to the phonostage. Your comments about eliminating a signal-wire junction on a circuit board are food for thought. Is a partially-decoupled main bearing a common design technique? Wouldn't abandoning a rigidly-fixed mounting invite some potential eccentricity? |
Although I don't doubt that the Rega 'arm must be more rigid, I will continue to use the Technics original because I have the KAB 78rpm mod and like the interchangable headshells. On my 'arm I use the KAB fluid damper plus the Music Direct tonearm wrap, but am still curious about upgrading the internal wire. A.J. Van Den Hul simply recommends bypassing internal 'arm wire by wrapping the upgrade wires around the 'arm exterior and not bothering to try and extract or replace the old internal wires. Only problem for me is that this would defeat the quick headshell interchangability. I have not detected any consequential shortcomings from the stock 'arm bearings, and the massive and silky-smooth locking, guaged helacoid VTA adjust is probably just as good or better than other available techniques going.
Johnnantais, the 1200 cannot be considered really high end until you have upgraded to an external power supply, based on my experience owning the KAB unit. My suspicion is that it is this area, rather than any comparitive shortcomings of the 'arm, that is the crucial limiting factor to deal with in order to unlock the deck's inherent potential. I think improved platter damping/mat selection, 'arm damping, clamping, support tweaking, and 'arm wire upgrading are all likely secondary to the PS, though all must ultimately be addressed (plus the lead-out cabling and jacks, my next order of business) in order to squeeze everything possible out of the basic goodness of the plinth and motor/controller fundamentals. |
PA - How are you contemplating attacking the 'arm-wire problem again? |
Quitting the DJ biz, eh? ;^) Your thread-starter said, "To be continued..." Where does the never-ending story lead now? |
When you say 'new', do you mean that this is a newly-introduced model? |
I have to call Kevin about that threaded clamp of his - it's something we talked about before, but I hadn't realized he was actually plotting to introduce one. (BTW, do you have the new strobe-defeat feature, and if so do you find it improves the sound?) We've also talked about the wiring - the lead-out cables and the tonearm wire - an area he had expressed a reluctance to get into, but I agree that from a marketing standpoint at the very least, one which ideally needs to be addressed.
The other main limiting factor inherent to the 1200, which is easily bettered in the majority of audiophile-approved TT designs (although not necessarily in the ubiquitous lesser Regas), is its too-resonant, thin aluminum platter. Kevin has thought of a good (if not entirely comprehensive) approach for dealing with this, but I understand it may be prohibitive in cost and production feasability. Still, I think that it (or something like it) can and should be attempted. In the meantime I'm getting by with the combination of the thin Technics rubber mat underneath a heavy Sorbothane mat, which together damps the platter ring better (and sounds better) than any other arrangement I've been able to try - including the stock Technics heavy rubber mat or any other single mat solution - but at the price of some difficulty with clamping thick vinyl pressings, a problem KAB's screw-down clamp ought to aleviate.
(PS - By the way, since I last posted anything substantial to this thread I've upgraded to a $900-list line-contact MC cartridge, and the sonic performance lets me know every day that it is in no way being wasted in this context, just in case anyone doubted such a proposition.) |
Thanks for your input Qualityman. My take on something like the strobe-disabler is that if you can be sure you do hear a difference, then that difference almost by definition must be for the better, rather than just a subjective change. Personally, I found the outboard PS to be an even more significant upgrade than the tonearm fluid damper, and I imagine the strobe-disabler - while I wouldn't expect the degree of its effect to be quite as important as the PS - would probably fall along the same general lines qualitatively speaking, so I can fathom what you're talking about in theory. With the PS, my number one description for its effect is increased purity and refinement. I'll post my results once I install these further upgrades from KAB. (Fran, have you gotten 'em yet?) |
I don't know how big a deal extra shielding is with the DC current and at whatever impedances are involved, but Kevin did tell me he didn't think this was a significant consideration. OTOH Psychicanimal did do roughly what you're thinking of, except with Rat Shack wire I believe (of a heavier guage anyway - I'm not sure about any shielding), and thought there was definite improvement, so I guess it depends who you ask. He urged me to try this as well, but I haven't gotten around to it. Along similar lines, both of us experimented with upgrading the power cord going into the PS-1200; he thought doing so made a worthwhile improvement for sure, I thought it sometimes made a marginal improvement when playing sensitive material (sufficiently small as to make it tough being honestly certain, although on balance I thought I heard just enough that I did elect to maintain the upgrade cord at the position), and Kevin seemed basically doubtful but appropriately deferential on the whole topic. Take your pick... |
Just the power supply, Sean. I mentioned the fact that the presumably unshielded twin-lead cord carries DC because it wouldn't radiate AC hum near the low-level signal cables. Although I realize an unshielded cable could act as a receiving antenna, it seems to me that if there's enough environmental EMI floating about to induce consequential problems on the TT's PS input, then that would be the least of one's worries with a phono signal. Anyway, the cable in question is like what's typically attached to your average wall-wart transformer, which many designers apparently regard as good enough to supply low-powered audio-amplification gear. Not that I know anything technical about the subject though, so I always appreciate your viewpoint. |
>"He actually claims an outboard power supply is not the right thing to do"
If so, then how does it work so well? Why do so many other (and otherwise dissimilar) audiophile TT designs use them as well? (Not to mention high-ticket 2-box preamp designs and even some power amps.) I have trouble believing the negligible DC resistance of a couple feet of wire (my multimeter measures it at about .1ohm) outweighs the benefits of getting the vibration-producing transformer out of the TT chassis, even if you could duplicate the entire improved PS in an onboard configuration. Sure, in an ideal world I guess all power sources would be located in intimate proximity with respect to the loads they're driving, but just as there are good reasons I don't have a generating station in my back yard or my tube monoblocks residing inside my loudspeakers, in the real world the best solution often seems to me to be the obvious and commonplace one. |
Psych: BTW, based on your post of 12/15, can I assume you replaced the internal output wires leading from the circuit board terminal to the output jack? They seem to get the job done to me, but I thought you must have noticed they ain't exactly garden hoses by your standards...or did you just hardwire your hookup to the board and skip the jack altogether? |
A passive switchbox might potentially introduce less degradation than running the phono input in and out of the receiver, but depending on how the internal routing on the receiver works the difference could be fairly negligible. The bigger difference in either switching scheme could be the introduction of the extra set of interconnects (and the expense for same). I recommend simply running a test comparing direct-feed to switched-feed to ascertain what's audible, and then balance what you find against the convenience factor. I think the gains just from going to the better phonoamp will handily exceed any small losses should you choose to go the switchable route. (Sorry, can't give any advice on your proposed amp choices.) |
Even listening through phones, the needle riding in the groove is always a constant source of vibration dealt with by the turntable. If the table is not supported in such a way that is compliant (to isolate the table from outside inputs) but also well-damped, then the effects of this self-generated vibration will linger longer and cause more subsequent interference at the stylus/groove interface, with audible effect on the reproduced sound.
Rigidly spiking the chassis to a sturdy rack might also work well in this regard as long as you listened through phones, but listening through the speakers on a springy floor with a so-so rack, damped compliance is the way to go.
What will work best is kind of a hit-or-miss affair, the system Q depending as it does upon the mass of the suspended table (and shelf if used) and the compliant and damping properties of the chosen supports (and their distribution and number used), not to mention the properties of the rack and floor. The whole interaction is probably too complex to predict usefully, especially given that the exact properties of the supports in a state of compression are likely an unknown, so trial and error to hear what works well is generally the easiest way to go about things here.
My own experience has been that compliant footers which are broadly shaped (not spherical or conical, though a very shallow hemisphere seems OK) and of relatively low height, made from fairly dense and soft (somewhat squishy, flexible) material that exhibits a 'slow' rebound character (is not bouncy), and used in numbers that keep each support under only medium compression (I use five 2" diameter pucks) do the trick.
The stock 1200 threaded feet are useful for the necessary task of leveling the table. So what I do is keep the feet on, but place whole shebang atop an inert shelf that is isolated from my rack by the compliant feet (my shelf is a Symposium and the feet are FoculPods; my rack is a Salamander Synergy that is also on casters and is not the most rigid thing going). I have thought about experimenting with removing the stock feet and replacing them with brass cones having the appropriate threaded posts to still work for leveling purposes - thereby coupling the table's chassis to the nonresonant shelf, which might function effectively as a vibrational sink, and eliminating a potential source of phase-reinforced interaction between the undoubtedly differently-tuned resonances of the two sets of compliant footers. But I haven't done it yet. |
Thanks for clearing that up - now I can see what this product is, and presumably how it works. The pics imply it is designed with the 1200 in mind, so leveling has been taken care of with the appropriate threaded post.
All the hoo-ha on the website about CAD modeling and simulation, CNC machining to 1 micron, special grade of alloy to "maximize the ratio of stiffness", etc. etc., is I'm guessing a prelude to a hit in the wallet. While all the claims may be true, what it looks like we have here is a pretty elementary device designed to 'hang' the load from compliant bands under tension rather than compression. If the bands are sufficiently self-damping and the set of 4 is properly tuned for the 1200's mass - and it sure should be judging from the come-on - then these ought to be quite effective. I believe the same principle is used in the suspensions of certain SME turntables, although more bands look to be employed.
I can't dispute that these feet cut quite the sharp profile under the table. Care to clue us in on the damages? |
BTW, $150 is actually about the lowest I would have guessed for those footers. I suppose I'm just used to high end pricing: if dem babies was made to retrofit something like Basis tables instead of the SL-1200, by their looks they'd go for $400 easy. And they'd get it too (so they probably ought to do it :-) |
Qualityman: Actually, TWL's system was assembled within non-extravagant budget constraints, something he makes clear if read through the body of the text. And its naturally limited HF dispersion, early LF roll-off, and single-driver suitability for near-field listening (required in his case - he lives in a log cabin) means it won't engender much in the way of nasty room interactions.
If you look again, you'll see he made his own speakers, and doesn't use a mega-$$$ cartridge or turntable/arm. The specially-commissioned amp (which is a bare chassis), while probably not exactly cheap, is still going to be much less than many popular kilo-watt monsters, or even plently of SET's requiring expensive output transformers. And he doesn't have any digital gear. The battery-powered aspect will add some investment that most folks don't have, but since TWL lives off of the power grid, he doesn't have to pay electricity bills - his rig is charged by solar power.
For the average audiophile, it's a lot easier to just throw money at their system than it is to intelligently craft a personal solution that synergistically brings together its creator's lifestyle and music reproduction preferences, which what I dare say TWL has done, much more than most. And Sean happens to be another one, but in about the opposite direction system-wise :-) |
I completely concur with your opinion of the potential in purpose-built listening rooms, based on my experiences in recording studios. From what I've heard, I agree that a good $20K system in a purpose-built $40K room will in the most important ways smoke the $60K system in a living room, though I can't extend the same benefit of the doubt to your hypothetical $1K system, or at least certainly not in any area except the room itself (the system *does* still matter). |
"I want to ask a question but have no technical knowledge so forgive me if it appears stupid."
I have to stipulate to the same ignorance but will not be able to beg forgiveness after what follows :-)
"It seems to me that the finest sounding products are DC powered. Kevin's PS1200 for the SL 1200..."
The PS1200 is what any normal audio power supply is: the part of the circuit that takes 60Hz, 120v alternating current from the wall and converts it to direct current that the component can use (simplified account). That description applies whether the power supply is located inside the component chassis or is housed separately, a not-uncommon configuration though still in the minority overall (excepting high end turntables). So it doesn't mean much to decribe the PS1200 - or the SL1200, with or without the PS1200 - as being "DC powered", because in that sense all gear is DC powered.
"Why couldn't all audio products be supplied...with a wall wart...? This removes the noisy transformer away from delicate electronic circuits."
It's true a wall wart removes the transformer from the chassis (as well as potentially limiting its size), but not the remainder of the power supply. Anyway, for most components not as sensitive to vibration as a turntable (and in truth that's all other components, despite audiophile obsession over the idea), with a little care taken in design and implementation the complete power supply is built into the single chassis with near-zero negative effects (and even some positive ones) - just witness the vast majority of high end gear.
But striving for the last squillionth of refinement, some all-out component designs do segregate the entire power supply (and frequently the non-audio control circuitry as well) in a second box. This may or may not be as effective as claimed compared to a single box, and may or may not be duplicable in a single box in terms of sound quality - after all, there's usually no real way of the consumer knowing for sure.
(The situation of the SL1200 which Kevin exploited in introducing his PS1200 is unusual in regard to high end turntables generally, which would never have this sort of stuff onboard to begin with, and now we SL1200 owners can appreciate why.)
"An obvious upgrade would then be a large transformer, mains powered with several DC outputs that could be used to replace the cheap wall warts."
Upgrade from wall warts, potentially yes. Musical Fidelity markets its X-PSU under this theory, but notice that their real high end gear contains either onboard power supplies or complete dedicated power supplies housed in second chasses. The power supply is one of the most important sections of any good piece of audio gear, and a designer needs to have a free hand to approach all aspects of a component wholistically, so one-size-fits-all is not a practical approach for more ambitious products.
Battery power is of course different (though not necessarily always, or in all ways, better), in that it requires no transformation from AC to DC or the attendant needs for isolation and smoothing the ripple. And you sever the connection to the powerline grid and therefore the noise and distortion that contaminates it, even though batteries can have their own practical difficulties and limitations. My own phonostage happens to be battery-powered, the application that's always seemed to me to be the easiest, and likely the most sonically productive, for which to implement the technique. |
Did you never get the 78's? I know those other machines wouldn't play 'em. I had Kevin mod my SL-1200 to play 78rpm (in addition to getting his fluid damper and outboard power supply), so even if I ever succumb to the siren song of some $$$K audiophile-approved belt-driver, I'll still have all the reason I need to hang on to my DD/DJ "piece'o'junk"... ;^) |
Ha! I was under the impression that AY had already done this and knew it was 'easy'...I was gonna ask him how it should be done!...Maybe the way to go is to simply buy a spare 1200 'arm (thanks to mass production and an R&D and tooling amortization that had probably paid for itself while I was still in elementary school, I understand they're not very expensive) and experiment on it... |
Been there done that. I'd rather hear about Qualityman's (sound)garden. The only "special feet" would be my bare ones, on the lawn. A lovely idyll for imagining here on a gray winter's day... (Oh I forgot Psych, you in da jungle now baby :-) |
