High mass vs Low Mass Turntables - Sound difference?


As I am recently back playing with analog gear after some 15 years away, I thought I would ask the long time experts here about the two major camps of record players -- high vs low mass-loaded-type tables...

For example, an equivalently priced VPI table (say a Classic, Aries or Prime) versus a Rega RP8/10 or equivalent Funk Firm table...  the design philosophies are so different ... one built like a tank, the other like a lightweight sports car...

Just wondering if the folks here have had direct experience with such or similar tables, and what have been your experiences and sense of strengths and weaknesses of these two different types of tables.



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Showing 2 responses by whart

Without getting into the relative merits of the two types of tables, one additional factor to take into account is isolating the high mass table. My Kuzma XL is approximately 168 lbs, and the HRS base for the various turntable parts to sit on is easily another 50-60 lbs. The HRS alone is not enough to isolate the table with springy wooden floors. Hanging this monstrosity from a wall is not so easy either. The cost of those high grade isolation bases - like a Minus K or whatever-- adds an additional cost. Though I prefer the sound of the XL to the smaller Kuzma Reference I owned previously, that table --which was no lightweight itself- had a suspension and was pretty much set up and go, right out of the box. Something to keep in mind for those without concrete slabs. 
@10timps - I had one of the original Well-Tempered turntables many years ago. It had been upgraded and tweaked considerably and was a terrific table for the money. The design, these many years later, is still quite ingenious. The difference I have experienced between that table and other higher mass tables that eventually replaced it was less of the sense of a turntable going around--I refer to it as a "halo" that is simply absent now. And bass performance is considerably better, even though I am using a linear arm, which is not the last word in deep bass delivery. There are, of course, trade-offs to the high mass approach, isolation being one of them, but such trade-offs exist with pretty much everything.