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Posts: 739
Location: Oregon
Joined: November 8, 2001
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Hi, Andy. Yes, thank goodness I have very little experience with TT's. Knowing what I think I know about vibrations, their sources, and their behaviors, and most importantly how crippling they are to every last component's precision and accuracy, I wouldn't touch one with a 10 ft. pole. Now I do have a 35 - 40 year old Technics SL-1200 semi-auto buried in a closet that I haven't even viewed in perhaps 15 years just to prove that point.
When I think what gymnastics TT designers have gone through to compound isolation strategy upon isolation strategy upon isolation strategy, I can't help but think what a frickin' nightmare some of them have created. And most importantly how much they've crippled that source's musical potential.
That's why finding the right formula for your dilemma is moot to me.
A local friend who seems to swap out his equipment whenever the season changes had purchased some vintage turntable for which he sent out for a $5k makeover that he seemed proud of at the time and wanted me to listen.
As usual his system sounded like absolute crap even though it's always music to his ears. As he was showing off his custom turntable, I noticed how badly his speaker drivers were warbling, quite severe actually. He expressed his concern too and he only listens at maybe 86 - 88db tops.
Not knowing nor wanting to know anything about turntables but after studying his for a few minutes, I asked him for some paper towels. I created about 8 small wads of paper towels rolled up nicely and pinched them between his free-floating spring-loaded base and the outer chassis. The severity of the drivers warbling was now only about half as intense. Wadded up a bunch more and now he's wadding up a bunch and eventually made the spring-loaded free-floating base quite snug against the chassis and the warble ceased while the sound improved quite a bit.
It's been about a year and I've not inquired but if he still has the TT, I'll bet dollars to donuts that he's still got all those paper towel wads all around the perimeter.
Yes, TT's are a frickin' box of chocolates and the more exotic they are, usually the worse they are engineered from a proper vibration mgmt perspective.
Don't get me wrong, from an aesthetics and intimate engagement perspective I love TT's perhaps more than the next guy and they make some gorgeous ones. But performance-wise they simply cannot hold a candle to what is possible working with non-isolation-based digital sources.
When I exhibited at RMAF 2011, I spent an evening at a very high-end distributor's home listening on what I guess was about a $250k system (add at least another $200k for the gawdy room). He put on Boston on his highly rated TT. Then it was my turn and I pulled out my very best manners and said, "That sounds really nice." and he smiled and nodded with great pride. What I should have said was "Amazing." and left it at that. You know, as in, "Amazing how you could dedicate so much resources and time to a system and room and this is the best you can do?" and as in, "Amazing you are still in business with such untrained ears.", and as in, "Amazing that your customers must all have hearing abilities not too unlike your own."
During the show, because at that time he distributed my amplifier, that distributor was routinely sending his visitors and dealers up to my room, telling his customers, "if you really want to hear what this amp is capable of, go up to Dynamic Contrasts room." I recently downgraded from that joker's $8k amp to a $2k amp and because of a new methodology I employ, the new amp is perhaps 50% more musical than that $8 amp ever was. I think it also worth mentioning that his $6k power cable that he insisted I use was no better than my fully-cryo'ed DIY $100 custom power cable.
The funny thing is that my exhibiting system only retailed for maybe $40k and most important was that at a show my racking system operates at maybe 5% of its full potential (since it takes months to reach its full potential). Truth be told, since my rack does next to nothing at a show, what visitors were hearing mostly were my fabulous Foundation Research line conditioners which by themselves will put my system on an even keel with perhaps the very best of any other system provided they are not employing similar superior line conditioners.
I've certainly had other experiences listening to some fine TT's.
Think of it this way, a given component is really no different than any other sensitive instrument, e.g. an atomic force microscope, and it takes very little in the way of undercontrolled vibrations to absolutely saturate and hence cripple a component's precision and accuracy. That said, now consider the layer upon layer of vibration methodologies employed on any given TT including air bladders and air pumps, etc. Talk about battling the laws of physics? Without stripping the TT and completely reconstructing it by removing all the garbage, there simply is no hope for any major sonic improvements. It's impossible.
But yet we're all aware of experiencing a given TT's minor improvements. How can that be if what I say is true? I can only speculate that when a negative is compounded by another negative there is a possibility of achieving a little positive, e.g. -1 x -1 = -0.5. When it comes to high-end audio I never ever use the term isolation in a positive way because 1) it defies laws of physics, and 2) because of #1, it cannot be considered a valid methodology, but only an extremely gross and inferior version of the one true methodology, resonance energy transfer.
Think about it, the air-borne and internally-generated (motors, power supplies, etc) vibrational energy will always be there and is already trapped inside and if given a few milliseconds to bottleneck it's going to release that energy right then and there post haste. If it can't find an expedient exit path, it will attach itself to objects within and release its energy there. Only now matters are compounded because now you have innards vibrating while at the same time vibrating in sympathy with the vibrations captured.
Hence, if those most exciteable and sensitive internal objects are further isolated within, whoala, a little improvement and the designer pats himself on the back thinking he's done good. And if somebody's pride and joy toward sonic nirvana is a TT, then it's pretty much a given they ain't doing much of anything different at the other components to help control vibrations there either. I mean, if Walker uses air bladders, then so should I. So in the end, having springs in a TT and objects freefloating really isn't that catastrophic after all since the rest of the system is also severely compromised so the music's pretty much guaranteed to be pretty flat and lifeless anyway.
Of course, then there's the problem of friction of the stylus at the groove and there's no getting around that frictional energy.
But to come full circle, perhaps the most common cry of the vinyl lover is, "I hosted a party last night and some 400 lbs. woman dancing by the TT caused my stylus to jump 14 grooves. Please help me so this never happens again." Enter sandboxes, kitty litter, bungie cords, springs, tennis balls, Sorbathane, innertubes, cork, rubber, etc. All the beautiful "high-end" materials that instantaneously trap all crippling vibrations already captured at the TT.
Other than that, I love TT's.
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