Why Linear Tracking never took off?

Phasecorrect,

Its a shame this never caught on; might have prevented the CD disease. No, not trying to start THAT discussion . . .

Have not read the whole thread, but have heard (2nd, 3rd and/or 4th hand info?) many albums were produced, i.e. the wax masters were cut, on linear tracking arm equipment, such as Ortofon (Ortophon?) systems. Hence, the arguement to play 'em on equipment like they were made.

I had an HK / Rabco ST-7 linear tracker. Nice but not all LP's have the same number of grooves/inch, so tangential tracking goes awry with albums differing from the average.

Currently have a Phase Linear Model 8000 Series Two. IIRC the photo-diode interrupt maintains +/- 0.3° true tangential. You can see it work on an album with an off-center hole, though movement is usually imperceptible. I've heard it was based on or OEM'd from Pioneer, though the unit Sean listed makes me wonder all over again - perhaps it was the other way around?

If anyone has a manual for the Phase Linear, I would be more than happy to reimburse expenses. Bought second hand, and the dealer never came through on the promised owner's and tech/repair manuals.

Had hoped to get a Sota or ClearAudio down the road, though it may be after some monoblocks. Guess I'm an outtadated wanabe, I'll have to read up on the Maplenoll.

Sean, please, let me know if you're selling any "excess" linear inventory!

Steve

trimmer@nodomain.net...With regard to groove spacing...it not only varies between records, but varies within a record according to the program. Loud music requires wider groove spacing, and for soft music closer grooves are OK. Variable groove spacing makes it possible to get more minutes of music on an LP.
The servo controlled linear tracking system of the Sony PS-X800 varies the arm movement speed so as to keep the tangential error angle down to nearly zero. (The spec is 0.05 degree).

And with regard to "CD disease" linear tracking would not have prevented that, but DBX-encoded records might have slowed it down.

Eldartford . . Good point, linear tracking alone would not have made a mass market difference. Correction to yesterday's note: though not the Sony's equal, the Phase Linear spec is 0.2°

At one time used a parametric equalizer, SAE 5k impulse noise reduction (click and pop filter) and a dbx 3bx. The remote was nice, but later realized (TAS) how important speaker placement and the minimal approach can be. With two grand boxed up, the unveiled clarity outweighed other benefits (to my wooden ears). Placed using a spectrum analyzer, my pathetic mid-fi two ways placed a realistic upright bass in my room. Recently discovered they can surpass Infinity RS-IIb's on basic instrumental works.

A decent cartridge costs more than Joe Schmo's system, we're stuck with the source material.

Getting late and for now, off this tangent,

Steve

As I remember it, the first significant stab at a "linear tracking" tonearm was the one fitted to the 1973 Garrard Zero-100 turntable. This was basically a conventional pivoting tonearm, but with a cantilever meachanism which rotated the headshell as it tracked across the LP, theoretically correcting the tracking error in the process. The arm was made of plastic, and the 'table was idler driven. Needless to say, it sounded pretty awful. The B&O came out a couple of years later and was a commercial success, if not a compelling audiophile performer.

I believe that the biggest obstacle to a satisfactory affordable linear tracking design is the lack of a simple mechanism to drive the arm along its linear bearing. It seems to me that this is where the costs of producing the existing molto expensivo designs builds from.

FWIW, I would expect that above a certain performance level, a linear tracking arm would indeed offer the potential for further sonic improvements. I say this by employing an arm-waving argument that says the geometric magnitude of linear tracking errors is potentially larger than the geometric correction applied by VTA adjustments, etc.

The Garrard Zero 100 got undeserved bad press and was often unfairly maligned - it's a little hard to understand why because it was a leader in much more than just zero tracking error.

It had:

an all-metal sub chassis suspended on foam cushioned coils.

a 5lb, hand balanced, cast aluminum, belt driven (not rim driven) platter running on an inverted, hardened single ball main bearing with the bearing situated at the center of gravity of the platter.

a balanced, synchronous motor so quiet and vibration free that, although independantly suspended, could probably run hard mounted to the sub-chassis without intruding.

a machined aluminum (not plastic) double rectangular (larger on smaller) section low mass tone-arm, articulated to track at zero error across the full width of the record. The cantilever was a thin (2 mm) aluminum tube that added about 2 grams to the overall mass of the arm.

and magnetic anti-skate with graduated scales for both conical and eliptical stylii. The amount of antiskate force applied automatically reduced as the arm tracked across the record.

I bought a Zero 100SB new in 1973 and have been using it ever since. I also own a Rega Planar 3/RB300, a Thorens 125/Rabco SL8E and Linn LP12/SME 3012. I'm a bit of a collector of TT classics and have a few more non-working examples under the bench waiting to join the ranks. I love all these turntables and can say without fear or favour that the Garrard holds its own in performance with the others and is way out in front in terms of character. It certainly deserves its place in this little collection of classics.

The main problems with the Zero 100 were marketing ones rather than performance. It had a clunky, noisy auto return mechanism that looked and sounded cheap and nasty in operation and a plastic headshell that had a non-locking slide out cartridge carrier that looked like it should be a performance weak point, but, in practice, turns out not to be. The auto return mechanism has no connection to the arm when not in use so its operation in no way affects the quality of the arm's performance and it still works today in exactly the same cheap and nasty, clunky, noisy, efficient way that it did in 1973.

If Garrard had incorporated a classier auto return mechanism, a single piece headshell and had charged significantly more for the turntable it would probably have had an easier ride into the high end where it belongs.