My personal experience with Direct Drive versus Belt Drive

Wow I'm jealous! I wish I had $10k to drop on a table. I've got about half that in my analog setup right now, and am very pleased with it. But, being an audiophile, nothing is ever, "good enough", so I'm always listening for that next upgrade. 

 I have to agree with Lewm, just because you liked that one table over the other doesn't mean all BD's will please you more than all DD's.  But I will say that I too hold a similar belief about Belt Drive sounding better, on average. 

There are inherent differences in design around each principle. Belt drives tend to have heavier platters, the motors are located farther from the cartridge, and in high end, the motor is often not even connected to the plinth. And the motor runs at higher RPM's than a Direct Drive. The Direct Drive has a pancake motor, that runs at 33.33. It supports the platter, the bearing is weighing on the motor quite often. And it places the motor windings in close proximity to the cartridge. The voltage fed to the motor is often electronically regulated, phase lock looped, to maintain perfect speed. Anyway, my point is, these differences in architecture have an effect on how the record is played.

I think the simplicity of a Belt Drive is why it sounds better, conveys more of the music, gets in the way less (at a given price point).  A simple bearing supports a heavy platter and the motor is isolated from the playback both in distance and isolation of the belt's elasticity. Higher RPM's smooth out motor pulses. So many things are right about Belt Drive. It solves many of the problems involved, except for one. Accuracy of speed. And that's where Direct Drive excels! But in doing so, it undoes so many of the things Belt Drive does right. Then suddenly platter weight, proximity of the motor, main bearing, and all those things must be dealt with differently. And what you wind up with are two very different sounding solutions to analog playback. Then there is rim Drive and idle wheel drive, they lie somewhere in the middle. Always a trade off, nothing is perfect. 

This is why I included the phrase, "at a given price point". My old Direct Drive Denon was $750. Of course, that was back in the '80's! And my Scout is now selling for $2K, no surprise it's a better 'table. It should be. But it's the main bearing and the 12 pound platter that really keep the noise down. On that old Denon the silence between songs sounded like a bowling ball rolling down an ally! Of course, at the time I thought it was great! And the platter was not physically part of the motor, the pancake motor was down in the plinth, I could lift the platter off and watch it spin. A platter that didn't weigh 2lbs. So while my external motor is being pulled sideways with its small bearing keeping it straight, it is of good quality and does it very well, and much less of its vibration winds up in the record atop that 12lb platter.  But again, two different price points. If I find a $4k direct drive, I'm sure it will out perform my Scout. Or I would expect it to anyway. "Cheap to make", may be an accurate statement, the $2k Scout may actually out perform a $2k Direct Drive. Any architecture can shine if you throw enough money at it. My first 'Table was an idler wheel drive, it was a BIC that cost me $120. It did a fine job for a 14 year old in 1976! But, not world class performance I suspect.