Grand Prix Monaco review in new Stereophile- OUCH

I would sum up his review as "damning by faint praise". This is of course, relative to the normal hyperbole. Kind of like when everybody gets an a in the class, and the dummy gets a B-. "Well its above average"..compared to what we do not know. Certainly took away any interest I might of had in it.

Cheers,
chris

Actually Monsieur Fremer, in all seriousness, thanks for giving us a "warts and all" review. Having seen your post, I reread your review... and yes, "damning with faint praise" would be, in retrospect, an overharsh opinion. It is obvious that there are things you have a hard time with on this turntable, and things you really like about it.

The sad fact is, for most of us, we cannot hear 4 tables with three arms and 4 cartridges, etc, the best we can do is maybe a dealer comes with one recommended setup to your house, in my experience. So sadly, we have to depend on turntable, cartridge and arm reviews way more than either you or we would like, I am sure. Many dealers will schlep an amp or a cd player, or ship one for an inhome demo, the same cannot be said for turntables.

Cheers,
Chris

Grooves. re: your accelerometer test. A three axis accelerometer would be capable of measuring both airborn and structureborn noise at the same time, but you can also just move a single axis acceleromter and make corrections for the published difference that Bruel and Kjaer notes for axis discrepancies , which by reading your report I am assuming you did. As a consultant and test equipment provider on way more structureborn and airborn vibration testing than I ever wanted to be, I can concur with you that a shaker test tells only part of the story. On measurements of transformers designed for nuclear subs, truly, as you suggest, lateral displacement is not the defining problem. When you add the effect of airborn noise (ie driver output) on a phono cartridge with sensitivity in the millivolt range, and complex air and structurborn waveforms that are arriving out of phase on all axises,( the same signal arriving at the speed of sound in air, while also arriving at the speed and r at a different time depending on the flooring, adding the flooring resonance) one can definitely theorize that more than lateral shaking should make for a better test and hence, product. However, one manufacturer I spoke with who sells his racks for upwards of 5k each considered $750 for a precision accelerometer and charge amplifer way too much of an investment. Kudos to Monaco for at least attempting to make some scientific, repeatable measurements. They, at least can prove that there is some definable, measureable resonance and vibration control on their stand although pseudo-random shock testing would most probably be the way I would start. (read footsteps and broadband) Good for you for taking the time to make some measurements and sharing them with us as well. Me, I am like the carpenter who comes home and doesn't fix the kitchen cabinet until I end up sleeping on the couch ;)

Cheers,
chris