Start with Project 1.2?


As a die-hard digital fan (ducks the chucked fruit) who wants to play the occasional record, does it make sense to start with something like the Project 1.2? I really like clean sound (read that: no pops, clicks, wow, flutter, hiss, etc) but am interested in seeing if I can hear the oft-mentioned warmth and quality of analog through my current gear. My early years of playing records were through gear that did justice to nothing but harmonic distortion. Given that most of what I was listening to at the time was not really much different than distortion it didn't make much difference. Once I started to transition to classical, jazz, folk, etc I really wanted to find better sound. I'm obviously looking to make the minimal investment that will still be worth listening to. If it truly takes, like, $2000+ to get a reasonable setup it ain't going to happen for me. FYI, my (tube) preamp already has the appropriate inputs for a turntable.
This is not a troll, but a serious question from someone who had really bad experiences with analog, albeit on crap gear.
tds234

Showing 2 responses by tds234

I didn't want to wait so I pulled the old direct drive from the basement along with some pretty pristine records from our combined collection. All I can say is WOW ! Even with a run of the mill Pioneer table and an audio technica cartridge ( that I'm sure I paid about $25 for) these albums sound great ! I can begin to see what the hubbub is about. I'm not sure where I'll go from here, probably something like one of decent upgrades pointed out above. (I keep drooling over at needledoctor) Right now I am enjoying the 'alive' sound that these albums have ( even with click, pops, and so on).
I did't get many responses, but the ones I did get forced me to reevaluate my assumptions and I'm grateful that I did.
I won't get rid of the Rotel cd player any time soon, but we'll be spinnin' albums around here a lot,...
In case anybody cares, I'm back to spinning vinyl and loving it. I upgraded my cartridge to a Grado Blue. I still have some tweaking and much album cleaning to do, but for now the vinyl bug is firmly entrenched. I'll continue to play vinyl and will probably start buying certain recordings on this medium. I am certainly going to go through the album collections of all friends and family to rescue anything not being played and will probably scope the area garage sales. Thanks to the folks who took the time to reply.