recommendation for a high end analog system


I never had an analog system until last month. I bought a 1989 SOTA TT with vacuum/Sumiko MMT arm/Dennon 103R retyped with elliptical/sapphire cantilever. My phono is Kitsune MK5 WBT that is amplified by Don Sach 2 tube preamp and Pass X350.5. My speaker are Sound Lab M545 ESL. The TT has been very   well maintained despite its age. It sounded very good until I heard my friend's system which has the same TT but with Lyra Skala cartridge and first generation Triplanar arm (Spectral pre/amp). His sounded noticeably clearer and fuller. What is the best way to get a noticeable improvement in my system without breaking the bank (or before I have to squint to hear the improvement). I would love to hear some wisdom from analog-philes.
128x128chungjh

Showing 4 responses by mijostyn

As another Sota owner I think bkeske has the right idea. Your arm is a little on the heavy side. Something a little lighter would be nice along with a better cartridge. Rauliruegas is right there. As a Sound Labs owner you will appreciate a cartridge with more detail, the Lyras, Ortofon Windfeld Ti, Soundsmith Sussurro  or Voice. As for tonearms, you are limited to 9" arms that will fit that include my favorite The Schroder CB but also the Reed 2G, the Kuma 4 Point 9, The SME IV or V, Origin Live arms and others. The current Tri-Planar arms will not fit without significant modification to the plinth. The Schroder will fit like a glove and is hard to beat at any price. If you call Sota with your turntable's serial number they will send you a new arm board. After that deal with the Phono stage if the sound needs more improvement. 
@dover , The Tri Planar is a great arm. Donna specifically told me that the current Tri Planar will not fit without cutting away part of the plinth cover. I was seriously considering it.
@lewm, although SOTA has not mounted one yet I believe the Reed 2G will fit. It was another arm I was considering. I got a dimensional drawing of the 2G and it will fit but it will require a light tonearm board. In the end I did not go for it because of the way the tonearm cable attaches to the arm. You would have to cut a notch in the dust cover to bring the cable out on top of the plinth. It does not make for a neat installation. The Schroder and Origin Live arms have cables that exit under the tonearm board which makes for a much neater installation and does not interfere with the dust cover.  I went with the CB because it meet all of my primary criteria in a very elegant way. It has one wire from cartridge to RCAs without any connections, it is neutral balance so VTF does not change with elevation, The vertical bearing is at the level of the record minimizing warp wow, it has frictionless anti skating and the bearings are top notch.
The new Cosmos comes with the Eclipse motor system which I will report on once I have the table which I put a $4K deposit on 3 MONTHS AGO.
bkeske, I also have a high output Soundsmith I am dying to hear.
chungjh, you really do not want to consider a different turntable. Once you are use to the bullet proof performance of the Sota and it's top notch isolation you will be unhappy with most other turntables including all of the VPIs. The Sota may not be the fanciest looking table out there but darn does it work well. 
@lewm , no argument from me. However it is not the duct cover that the Tri Planar in interfering with, it is the plinth cover. Because the Tri Planar drops down in the rear and that the Sota's tonearm board is recessed the counter weight runs into the cover. What people think is the plinth on the Sota is just a cover. The "plinth" is really suspended inside from the base plate. You could make the Tri Planar fit by cutting away that part of the cover that would be behind it but Sota will not do that themselves because they think that is cosmetically unacceptable. You could do it yourself. My own thinking was that the Schroder fits perfectly and is on par with the Tri Planar so why start chopping things up especially since this may not be my last turntable. I still have my eye very much on the Dohmann with a Schroder LT.

bkeske, When I was getting the "Voice" I asked Peter what the difference between the "Voice" and the Sussurro (a low output version of the "Voice") was. His reply was "larger coils in the Voice." Since the coils are fixed and there is no reduction in moving mass with smaller coils my next question was "then why is the Sussurro $2K more expensive?" He said," market economics." I also asked "then why wouldn't the "Voice" be a better cartridge having a much lower signal to noise ratio." His reply, "It is." He said that he only makes low output cartridges because they are more profitable and people want to use their fancy, expensive high gain phono stages. They are stuck on thinking low output cartridges sound better. Then I got the Strain gage pitch. Which I would like to hear. I thing the Hyperion is too expensive to make to justify a high output version. People who buy high output cartridges will not spend $7K on a cartridge.
bkeske, the beauty of the Sota dust cover is that it is attached to the plinth cover which is connected to the chassis. The sub chassis which holds the platter and tonearm is hanging from the chassis with 4 springs tuned to 3 Hz. Nothing that happens above 3 Hz gets to the sub chassis and that includes everything that is happening to the cover and dust cover including banging it with a hammer. Try it, really! Using the dust cover during play is like giving your cartridge hearing protection. It also keeps the record's exposure to dust and pollution limited and it is also brilliantly simple to use. I had this discussion with Mark Dohmann and he totally agrees. He is or has designed an isolated dust cover for his Helix tables to use during play. 

So, do yourself a favor and order a dust cover from Sota!