Need Turntable advise

i have no direct experience w/the technics, other than i know it's a top-choice of dj's...

most *audiophile* folks prefer belt-drive, but there have been some excellent direct-driven 'tables out there - nakamichi & micro-seiki come to mind.

for the best bang for the buck, i'd recommend a used 'table, there are many to choose from - while i prefer my oracle (naturally!), there's linn, basis, sota, yust to name a couple of the more common ones. also nice are kuzma, pink triangle & well-tempered. there was yust listed on a-gon's classified a linn w/a grace tonearm for $550 - if it's in good shape, this would be wery nice for the money...

good luck, doug

I would first ask: What are you using as your Phono Pre, and what is its gain in db? What is your budeget? On the low end a Music Hall MMF-2($300 list including cartridge), new or a used one, the MMF-5 is a worthwhile upgrade($500 list including cartrige). This tables come with phono cartridge and are pretty good. I listened to the MMF-2 against a $4000 cd player, and it beats the pants of it. The sky is the limit. State budget and phono pre and we will help some more.

With your present table a new cartridge is an alternative. As a rule direct drive turntables are more noisy (background noise) than belt drive ones. The main bearing is the heart of the turntable, mediocre bearing, meadiocre turntable.

I also own an Oracle, but there many other excellent turntables for less money out there.

I'm with Doug, I love my Oracle tables (Delphi IV in my main rig, Alexandria in my home office system). The list above is pretty comprehensive; if you want to get a quality turntable at a reasonable price the list ought to also include Rega, SystemDek IIX (I have one in my system at work), or even some older Thorens (TD147 or TD160). Jeff

Rega is a very popular choice for an entry-level TT but my favorite is Thorens. Very high quality and you can find cheap ones on the used market for less than a Rega. I have owned both and prefer the full-sounding Thorens to the lean sounding Rega. My budget TT now is a Thorens 320 MkII with the built-in arm and a Dynavector 10x4 cartridge. You can get a setup like that for about $600-$700.

Shouldn't advise be spelled with a "c" ? = advice

VPI JR is a safe place to start. Michell and Nottingham, offer very good sound at mid prices. Pick one your interested in and post here and you are bound to get opinions from someone who has heard it.

The best turntable value of all time is the Rega Planar 3 with the RB300 tonearm. This combination is now called the P3. It is very basic, straight forward to use, lasts forever, and sounds too good given the price! Once I heard a direct comparison of a Rega Planar 3 with a Grado Platinum cartridge against a Lin LP12 with Circus upgrade and Lingo power supply, Ekos tonearm, and Archiv cartridge. The Rega smoked it! We were all shocked! Another good inexpensive table is the old Systemdek IIX, now made by Audio Note. If nothing else, make sure you get a table with a Rega RB300 arm. No arm under $2000 sounds better!

Is the VTA adjustable on a Rega RB 300 arm ? Sean
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On the Rega RB300, VTA is set using spacers/shims in fixed increments. A few companies make adapters for the Rega to give it continuous VTA adjustment. I think VPI makes one.

Thanks everyone for the advice. I'm going with a used Systemdek IIX. And a special thank you to Clamps2000 for the spelling lesson.
Rick

I thought you simply had forgot the semicolon. But the advice you got was good nonetheless.