TW-Acustic Raven 10.5 or DaVinci Grandezza??

Dertonam,

Just a quick note to say thank you for your input. Whilst we all may have differing views, your posts above raising the questions on coil output, electrical behaviour and stylus alignment vs asymuth are thought provoking and add significantly more to the discussion than comments such as "blah blah blah" and he said/she said type arguments.

Thanks again for taking the time to explain your views, some of us appreciate that.

Hey Raul,
I know heaps, I've forgotten heaps and I'm sure there is always opportunity to learn more. What's wrong with thanking someone for putting time and effort into explaining their experiences.

By the way with regard to the RIAA curve, since you are a manufacturer of phono stages, the comments I made on an earlier other thread were slightly askew. The RIAA standards require amplifiers that drive the cutterheads to apply compression and expansion above and below 1000hz. The engineers could not build amplifiers in those days to do that and In actual fact you will find the turnover points are actually around 400hz and ( I cant remember the figure ) but around 4000hz. This means for accurate reproduction of RIAA recordings you actually need a flat midrange at around 400hz to 4khz.
As stated earlier I have a mathemetician/engineer mate who has modelled this revised RIAA playback in an op amp based phono stage ( not your normal stuff, the op amps used are next generation designs not yet available to manufacturers ) and the organic wholeness of the midrange is revelatory.
Ironically you could drive the cutterheads far more accurately today as regards RIAA compression/expansion with digital amps.

Cheers,

Dertonam et al,

Another problem I have seen many many times is caused by armboards that are not perfectly level and referenced to the platter resulting in vertical bearings off level and the arm running uphill or downhill. Antiskate has been used to compensate for this incorrectly. How many people run a dial gauge over the platter and armboard to check the allignment - a simple and worthwhile exercise before mounting arms. Any TT with a wooden armboard is a nightmare in this respect.

The discussion has been great but the original thread was

"I am getting a Raven one but will have a choice of the Raven 10.5 or DaVinci Grandezza for just $2000 more! Which should I go for? Well I am not sure if Raven one is a good match to this super arm but the 10.5 have got great reviews. Please give soem advice."

Has anyone thought to ask how you can get either of these arms for $2000.
Is he paying too much for the Raven One or could the arms on offer be dodgy ?

The best answer may be to buy the Grandezza for $2000, sell it and then buy a new TW Acoustic.

Halcro,
Thanks, I was a bit hasty re-reading the initial thread. In retrospect I think you are right. Does add context though, as the question becomes is the Da Vinci worth the extra $2k. I'd buy the Rhodanized Da Vinci if it were me. I would be wondering is he talking about buying a Raven One or Raven AC - 1 motor. If he is buying the Raven One then the extra money may be better spent on upgrading the turntable, to AC1 if possible..

The discussion has been great but the original thread was

"I am getting a Raven one but will have a choice of the Raven 10.5 or DaVinci Grandezza for just $2000 more! Which should I go for? Well I am not sure if Raven one is a good match to this super arm but the 10.5 have got great reviews. Please give soem advice."

Has anyone thought to ask how you can get either of these arms for $2000.
Is he paying too much for the Raven One or could the arms on offer be dodgy ?

The best answer may be to buy the Grandezza for $2000, sell it and then buy a new TW Acoustic.

Apologies for last post double up - my mac is playing up.