Chung, once you are use to a Sota the other tables will drive you nuts.
Just get a Noba Vacuum. Jelco is out of business and I think you are headed in the wrong direction with a low compliance cartridge. You just increase record wear. There are many medium to high compliance cartridges of the highest caliber. Just put the most expensive Origin Live arm you can afford on it. Stay away from unipivot arms!! |
@lewm and just what do you think Smashing Pumpkins is at 100 dB
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The Sota not only isolates you from a bad rack but everything else that is going on in the room...like the music. |
@mulveling , even the light FR arm is a tank and will be too heavy for many fine cartridges. Not only that but in reality they are not the best designs. Removable head shells are a terrible thig to strap a tonearm and cartridge with. Not only do they add unnecessary contacts but they add mass right where you do not want it forcing you add more mass at the other end of the arm increasing the arm's moment of inertia ruining it's ability to follow record undulations. It is easy to add mass to an arm for a stiffer cartridge, not so easy to take it away. It is always best to start with a light arm. They are static balance arm thus the VTF changes with elevation and the bearings are high above the record surface increasing warp wow. There are so many excellent arms out there now that have none of these problems, Origin Live, Reed, Schroder, Tri Planar and more. The Origin Live Encounter is an excellent arm at $1500.00 |
@lewm, boy Lou to much coffee today?
First, as for removable head shells, you not only have the mass of the head shell but the mass of the contacts the socket and the retaining lock ring on the tonearm. A situation like an SME, Reed or Schroder is obviously much lighter. This unnecessary mass, there only for your convenience is at the end of the arm where it contributes more to the effective mass of the arm and the arms polar moment of inertia making more difficult to move. This is not my opinion Lou but obvious fact in pretty simple engineering term.
We seem to be confused on terms. A dynamic balanced arm has a counterweight that is set for balance then tracking force is added by a spring or similar mechanism. This has nothing to do with static vs neutral balance. A neutral balance arm which is the ideal has a line that goes through the center of mass of the counterweight through the vertical bearing and the center of mass of the cartridge. A neutral balance arm will not change VTA with elevation. When you position it anywhere vertically it will stay there. Examples are the Tri-Planar, the Reed 2G, the Schroder CB and some of the more expensive Origin Live arms.
Static balance or stable balance arms if you draw a line through the center of mass of the counter weight and the vertical bearing that line will go above the center of mass of the cartridge. These arms will change VTF with elevation and if you position them high and let go they will hunt up and down looking for the balance point and eventually they will stop at a "stable" balance point. Neutral balance arms simply follow the record much better. None of this is my opinion. Ed Villchur had this figured out when I was knee high to a grasshopper.
Why are you arguing about the vertical bearing being at record level? Warp wow is an obvious problem. If you don't think so take one of your test records and play a test tone with a nickel under the edge of the record. Pretty impressive! Not only can warps be a Nickle high but they are much more acute. Having vacuum clamping helps negate this problem. Raising the vertical bearing above the record surface makes warp wow worse. Again, not my opinion. The best tonearms pay homage to these design issues. The FR's may be nicely made but they are not good designs. Neither is the SAT arm for that matter. Go figure. I buy a tonearm for the best performance under all conditions. If that sacrifices convenience so be it. Heavy tonearms and stiff cartridges increase record wear and distortion during playback as the increased inertia causes the cantilever to move instead of the tonearm. I have seem oscilloscope traces showing this clearly. Some have hypothesized that this is the reason some tangential arm sound better because they are short, light and have much less inertia, following the record better, generating less distortion. Don't yell at me. Not my study and I have no idea. Makes sense though.
If you ask Mark Dohmann what is the best sub $20K turntable on the market he will immediately tell you the Sota. He is just as allergic to direct drive tables as I am. His main claim to fame is turntable isolation, isolating the cartridge from vibrations generated by anything other than the record. A suspension is essential for this purpose. I personally would never buy another turntable without an adequate suspension. But, that is me. People buy turntables for reasons other than their performance and stability.
Don't turn your turntable on and place the tonearm down on the record. Turn the volume up and have a look at your woofers or diaphragm in your case. A woofer will be not be motionless. Not sure about the diaphragm. Don't think I can see mine. Anyway, that woofer motion is environmental rumble. Some people call it room rumble but there are many causes outside of the room like the cement truck traveling down your street.
A properly suspended table will be dead silent. No environmental rumble.
I am all for spirited discussion lewm, and there have been occasions where I have been dead wrong and I do not mind at all learning that I am wrong. It is a great way to learn right. I hope we can avoid getting bitter about such trivial things. |
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@lewm, I promise I will not come back at you with airborne vibration
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Exactly, I did not buy the Infinity arm because it was not stiff enough. I got a Syrinx PU 3 which was not a neutral balance arm but it was very stiff and no removable head shell. The removable head shell and it's socket are unnecessary mass at the end of the arm and an additional set of contacts. Maybe it is only a few grams, still IMHO unnecessary. Although the SME style locking mechanism is very stiff you are probably right, a fixed head shell is stiffer. The arm tube on my Schroder is dampened carbon fiber BTW.
A stable balance tonearm increases VTF as it goes up. That is why it hunts for the balance point. The easiest way to tell is lift up the arm just an inch and gently let it go. A neutral balance arm will just stay there. A stable balance arm will start hunting up and down. It is not enough to have the counter balance weight at the level of the record. The center of masses at both ends of the arm have to be in line with the axis of the vertical bearing. I have played with a FR arm. I do not recall the model.
There is a lot you can tell about an arm by just looking at it. For instance an "S" tube arm is going to be heavier than the same arm with a straight tube. The straight arm will also be stiffer. An arm with a removable head shell is going to have more mass than the same arm with a fixed head shell. The Kuzma is a great compromise BTW. Mass at either end of the tonearm is more significant than mass near the pivot. This is what effective mass is all about. Like a seesaw inertia is affected most b mass at the ends. Inertia is different than effective mass.
Tonearm design requires a bunch of tradeoffs. Is there one right balance?
I doubt it. I prefer lighter arms and more compliant cartridges but there are limits as too how light you can go. Is the FR stiffer than say my Schroder. I seriously doubt it. IMHO the FR does not justify the added mass. For stiff cartridges I would rather add just as much mass as needed to the Schroder. |
@chakster, for people who want to swap cartridges all the time removeable head shells are very convenient but, they are a compromise when it comes to performance. If I really needed a removable head shell I would not get any of those arms. I would get a Kuzma 4 Point 9.
I have found that I only want to listen to one cartridge, the one I like best. With the exception of 78's the best cartridge is always best at all genres. I also do not mind setting up cartridges. I am not willing to compromise. I want the best performance possible considering the tradeoffs. Once I set up a cartridge it stays put for years, sometimes more than a decade. If comparing cartridges is your thing the best way to do this is with multiple arms. Unfortunately for me the only turntable I like that takes two arms is the Dohmann Helix which has not fully evolved yet and is currently out of my price range anyway. |
It seems to me we are all coming around to the same place.
@lewm, I handily agree that if things like contacts and stiffness are going to be a problem the are certainly going to be worse with a stiff, low output moving coil cartridge. This says nothing about record and stylus wear.
I myself have migrated away from stiff low output cartridges and am using more compliant MM and MI cartridges. I also have to admit that many of my concerns are academic and I really do not know how much they affect the experience with the exception that lighter setups do outperform heavier setups. the oscilloscope traces I saw were more than convincing.
A tonearm with a detachable head shell may sound exactly the same as a tonearm of similar effective mass, without a removable head shell and with the same cartridge of appropriate compliance. As you say the most important issue is that the cartridge match the tonearm. I also agree that the differences between excellent cartridges is nuanced, not dramatic at all. Which makes me wonder why someone would pay $16,000 for a cartridge? Then again why would someone pay $250,000 for an amp?
Crazy hobby. |
Chakster is right, compliance tells you nothing about the sonic characteristics of a cartridge. The problem is the resonance frequency of the moving mass of the stylus/cantilever/coil, magnet or iron assembly and it's suspension. You have to keep it up over the audio band or you get bright peaky performance. The heavier the moving mass, the stiffer you have to make the suspension. Because moving coil cartridges usually have higher mass assemblies their suspension has to be stiffer. There are some moving coil cartridges with very light moving masses now using plastic crosses for the coils instead of a metal and very powerful rare earth magnets. They tend to be very expensive, read overpriced. IMHO moving magnet and MI cartridges tend to be a much better value. Some would argue their performance can be better than moving coil cartridges. In terms of signal to noise ratio and therefore dynamics there can be no argument that they are better. Other qualities it depends who you talk to. |
Lewm would be talking about me. And there are several issues which he and I have fundamentally opposite views.
An isolated turntable like the SOTA is very obviously better at protecting against foot fall skipping which on anything other than a concrete floor can be a problem for analog lovers. Having to tip toe around is aggravating. DJ's use DD tables because of the torque which they need to slip "Q" and create other effects. Dance floors are usually concrete so, there is never an issue with foot fall skipping. Isolating the cartridge from extraneous "vibration" is critical for the best sonic performance. The cartridge is a very sensitive vibration measurement device. It will gladly pick up any vibration passed through the turntable or even the air. IMHO isolation is more important than the utmost in speed stability. The difference between the best belt drives and DD tables is extremely minor and by all accounts inaudible. Those of you who do not have suspended turntables place your tonearm down on a stationary record and turn the volume up. Go look at your woofer. I will be bouncing to one degree or another. That is environmental rumble. It will occur even on concrete floors. If you have a properly suspended turntable your woofer will remain in neutral position without any movement. Subwoofer users are going to be more sensitive to this for obvious reasons. Lewm does not use subwoofers. Airborne vibration is also a problem and might possibly be the reason some people prefer heavy tonearms and stiff cartridges as they will be less affected by this than light arms and compliant cartridges. The solution to this is an isolated dust cover, hearing protection for your cartridge. The Sota offers both a well designed suspension and an isolated dust cover. Lewm had an older Sota that apparently had speed stability issues. His table may have had issues but, that issue, if it was one, has been permanently solved by Sota's new drive train which will hold on to 331/3rd like a pitbull. On top of this Sota offers vacuum clamping which in the opinion of many is the best way to hold a record down, remove minor warps and dampen the record.
How much of a sonic difference does all this make? No idea. I have never run that comparison. You would have to put the same tonearm and cartridge on an example of each type of turntable and make an AB comparison playing identical copies of the same record. Would be fun to do. The rags are not interested in proving anything at the cost of losing a advertiser. We have to do this sort of thing ourselves to learn anything and it is expensive. However, the foot fall problem is painfully obvious and there can be no question that a properly designed suspension solves this problem. |
Thank you Ralph. In addition the cartridge is on a pivoted tonearm with it's own suspension and vibration characteristics. Noise in the room will affect the tonearm differently than it will the chassis creating a differential the cartridge could certainly pick up. With vibration passed through the bass such as foot fall the base is actually doing the moving and the chassis sits still in the same position in space.
@chakster, if you have 100 people dancing on a bad floor the Technics will fail badly. DJs use them because they are cheap and they have a lot of torque. Not to mention that they put an oscillating magnetic device right under a very sensitive magnetic pick-up. No scientist in his right mind would ever do such a silly thing:-) |
@lewm , We fully agree that a low compliance cartridge benefits from a high mass arm. Stylus shape and VTF certainly influence record wear. However, given the same stylus shape and the same VTF the low compliance/high mass combination will have accelerated record wear vs the high compliance/low mass pair. You and I both prefer higher compliance lower mass combinations.
My aversion to direct drive turntables comes from pretty extensive listening tests back in the late 70's early 80's. The universal opinion was that direct drive turntables sounded inferior to the best belt drive turntables. There were various theories of why this might be, none of them proven that I know of. I do know that isolating the turntable from everything else going on around it including the music is very important.
The degree to which suspended turntables do this is pretty easy to see and measure. Consequently I will never own a direct drive turntable and I will never own a turntable that does not have an adequate suspension.
I have one more issue, fuel to add to the fire. Turntables are a prime target for flippant design, The Clearaudio Statement is a great example.
There is no advantage in making a turntable look cool. It is just a total waste of money. It has nothing to do with sound, purely visual. Mechanical artwork. Other manufacturers followed suite. IMHO the very best turntable made is the Dohmann Helix. Still very expensive but plain, unassuming in comparison to other tables in that price range. I also think Mark Dohmann has the right approach to turntable design.
I'm sorry if I seem to be a stuck record when it comes to the influence of a motor near a cartridge. Electro-mechanical devises have a way of influencing each other especially in close proximity. If you put the close together no amount of shielding is going to stop that interaction. |
Chungjh, that is obviously true of cars although I have put a reservation down on a cybertruck arguably the ugliest vehicle ever conceived. I also use a 911 as a daily driver a form follows function car if ever there was one.
As far as a turntable is concerned performance trumps everything including looks. If you are buying a turntable for looks perhaps you are not an audiophile?
@chakster, You expect me to remember models from 30-40 years ago?
Lets put it this way, they were so bad that it scared me out of direct drives forever. The designers that I have the most confidence in also shied away from direct drive like Mark Dohmann, David Fletcher and AJ Conti. There is no direct drive table that meets my requirements particularly when it comes to isolation. Technics turntables are like Toyota cars, very reliable reasonably well made pedestrian fair. Over the 30 years I have been out of the audio business nothing much has change that would get me interested enough to consider buying one although there are several newcomers on the market that make interesting products it is rare for me to purchase something from a small newbie that has yet to establish themselves in the market. Besides I am perfectly happy with the turntable I just purchased. It is right at the point of diminishing returns and does everything I need a turntable to do. The next turntable in line would be the Dohmann Helix 2, a substantially more expensive turntable.
I put my money where my mouth is. I could have easily purchased an SP10R. |
A solid mat is just as bad as a mat that is too soft. |
Chakster, I have much more important things to do besides remember the names and models of turntables we all dismissed as being Japanese garbage. Actually, now that I think of it I do not own one piece of Japanese equipment not even a cartridge or a car. Guess I have not forgiven them for WW2 yet. To much mysticism in their gear for me. Do you bow down to your turntable every time you turn it on? Might be a good idea. I can understand the Idler wheel guys. There was a day when the British made the absolute best. Someday you will hear the light and get yourself a decent turntable. It will be fun to hear all those antique cartridges for real and not mutilated by magnetic fields:-) |
@lewm, I though your problem with your Sota was speed variation? The Sota's suspension lacks real damping so it will bounce if you get it started but since the sub chassis is enclosed that does not represent much of a problem. The MinusK platforms are not dampened either. People have complained of them bouncing if you lean on them. The heavy mass approach does not work well at all. Place you tonearm down on a record with the turntable off. Watch the woofer or subwoofer move. In you case it would be the diaphragm if you can see it. Have someone jump on the floor while you observe the woofer. With the Sota you will see nothing. That is working pretty good in my book.
@atmasphere , I know Ralph, that is why I always reference my opinion as coming from the distant past. I just love rubbing chakster the wrong way:-) The real issue for me is because of my long term use of subwoofers with ESLs isolation is more important to me than absolute speed accuracy although Sota's new drive seems to be very close to DD standards none of them have a suspension I would care to run with subwoofers and mine run 5 dB up from zero at 20 Hz which is what it takes to load the room correctly. I have had solid plinth tables here to set up for friends and even with a concrete floor the subwoofer drivers flutter.
I'm sure your plinth was better. If you have one of your turntables around it would be interesting to install Sota's Eclipse system and see what you get. If the wow and flutter are down at 0.03% or even less than 0.05% I can't see how you could want better than that. I think the SP10R is down around 0.02%. That difference is totally inaudible where as lack of a suspension is totally audible. |
@atmasphere, Ralph, I just bought a new Sota so another turntable is not going to happen in the near future. I will listen for a "shimmer" in the sound stage. DD turntables have always speced well in regards to speed stability. That was not enough to help them years ago. It would be fun to have one in my system for a sort while to hear a modern one but nobody I know has one. There are other issues however. I am sold on vacuum clamping which is not provided with any DD table I am aware of. A suspended plinth I can easily make. |
Ralph it was not misinformation. We had several of them from different manufacturers in the store and we compared them at length with SP 12's and a Goldmund Table. They were all lifeless in comparison and all of us heard the same thing. I sold a bunch of them at Luskin's and had I don't know how many people complain of the way they sounded. Luskin's was a box store that never took anything back unless it was defective out of the box. Not sounding good did not qualify back then. Nothing like having to deal with a pissed off customer. At Sound Components we did not have that problem. We sold everyone LP12's .
As for Sota's vacuum clamping system there are two important details. 1st is a much better mat that matches the mechanical impedance of vinyl. Second is the compressor switches automatically to a low pressure mode once the record is clamps. This puts much less vacuum on the record and also saves the compressor from having to do a lot of work. It is perfectly safe but, you can still buy a Cosmos without it. On top of this the new Cosmos has a magnetic thrust bearing like the Clearaudio turntables abolishing bearing wear and halving the noise. Then there is the Eclipse drive system (which I have not heard yet) which by all accounts is extremely accurate and stable. Rumble is a more serious consideration for me than the difference between 0.02 and 0.03% wow and flutter. Then there is a fine suspension and an isolated dust cover. These are all items I have to have. I can make them myself but my wife would rather keep me building cabinets and furnisher. I could have bought an SP10R used the same turntable and built a suspended plinth with a dustcover. I chose not to. Old habits die hard. |
@lewm, I think there might be some confusion here. I think, correct me if I am wrong the you are refering to groove speed which slows down towards the center of the record. That does not affect friction and skating much. Groove velocity refers to the distance the stylus has to travel in the groove. In a more heavily modulated groove the stylus has to travel farther but never in a straight line. The stylus has to keep changing direction which takes energy. Thus as the groove velocity increases friction and skating increase and the groove becomes progressively harder to track. This is why skating is so hard to peg. It keeps changing with modulation (groove velocity) |
@lewm , in the record industry groove velocity is almost a synonym for groove tortuosity. Groove velocity is the distance the stylus travels in the groove divided by time usually in cm/sec The more heavily modulated groove has a higher velocity as the stylus must travel farther. You are referring to groove speed as not affecting friction which as you have mentioned many times, it does not. But, you agree that groove velocity certainly does!
@atmasphere,that is a reasonable assumption except maybe for millercarbon:-) |
@antinn , Thanx for a very lucid explanation. 1000G's, that means the groove is subject to a force 1000 times the weight of the stylus over the styluses contact area. A formula 1 driver is subject to something like 5 G's under braking. 1000 G's that is nuts. |
I like the term linear velocity vs groove velocity. Yup if you look at a Neumann lathe it is obvious that there is some serious stuff going on with the head. That they can keep the whole mess quiet is more amazement.
Thanx for the article antinn. |
@antinn, Dr Max looks just like Harpo! Fun to read older rags like this. Those were the Dynagroove days:-) |
@lewm, that is a very complicated way of admitting you made an error in terminology:-) In my simplified mind velocity and speed are synonyms.
I think we agree on the difference and the effect it has on skating. We only disagree on terminology. But, somehow Ralph and I seem to understand each other. Maybe he is just lowering himself to my level of mentality to be polite.
@atmasphere , 30 dB is a lot of feedback! I didn't know that, but then controlling the cutting stylus at that level and managing to come out with the results you get with any good pressing is amazing in an of itself. |
I know @lewm , I'm just pulling your leg. The more heavily the grove is modulated the higher will be the groove velocity. Speed is determined where the stylus is on the diameter of the record. It slows as you mve towards the center. Yes, at higher velocities might have to change directions more often and more vigorously but this is frequency and modulation dependent. Obvious the skating force increases at higher groove velocities because the stylus assembly has mass and changing directions faster increases drag proportionally. One could say that friction increases but drag would probably be the more appropriate term as friction does not change skating much but drag does. |
