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My Dumb Question of the Day

I feel strongly that I should ask a dumb question every day. Audiogon's turn.

When I am playing an LP I clearly hear the music when the amp is off. I know that this is how the phonograph has worked from the beginning (the old wind up Victrola at my sister's house), but is this really a good thing. Would better more efficient coupling improve the signal to the cartridge, would better damping of the tonearm improve the signal, basically, is this accoustic phenomena less noticable on a really high end turntable.

I'm using a Clearaudio Champion with Aurum Beta S and RB300 arm.
jpharris

Showing 1 response by tobias

tobias
1,534 posts
 
This phenomenon is known as "chatter", I believe. The less resonant your arm-cartridge system, the less you will hear it. I used to hear more of it from my RB300/Glider than I do now with an RB300/Cardas Heart (a much more expensive cartridge). This, even though the Heart has a wooden body and the Glider has none. The two cartridges both came from Benz but there are several design differences that could account for the reduction in chatter.

Naturally you do not want any chatter, since it is energy that is feeding back into the arm-cartridge-TT system and smearing the sound.
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