Dlh,
It's not that simple. There are basically three designs with many variations: direct drive, belt and rim drive. All are actually quite viable if done properly. The argument of motor isolation is correct. I owned a very nice Denon direct drive thinking it almost state-of-the-art until a belt-drive clearly displayed all of the sought after attributes of blackness and superior sonic musicality.
I replaced the dd and lived in bliss. A friend with some very big dog equipment last year purchased an older Luxman dd table, set it up with his older Sumiko 'The Arm' and a new Grado wooden body cartridge. So far this table has embarressed all comers to include Linn and Sota.
Many years ago one of the tables to own was the rim drive Dual 1229 which still sounds quite viable today. To quote, "It's not what you do, but how you do it".
It's not that simple. There are basically three designs with many variations: direct drive, belt and rim drive. All are actually quite viable if done properly. The argument of motor isolation is correct. I owned a very nice Denon direct drive thinking it almost state-of-the-art until a belt-drive clearly displayed all of the sought after attributes of blackness and superior sonic musicality.
I replaced the dd and lived in bliss. A friend with some very big dog equipment last year purchased an older Luxman dd table, set it up with his older Sumiko 'The Arm' and a new Grado wooden body cartridge. So far this table has embarressed all comers to include Linn and Sota.
Many years ago one of the tables to own was the rim drive Dual 1229 which still sounds quite viable today. To quote, "It's not what you do, but how you do it".