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Should I get into vinyl now ?!

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Posted on March 4, 1999 at 20:45:51
nataraj


 
My equipment right now is ML Aerius / Golden Tube se-40 / old mod-squad passive line stage / pioneer 414 dvd player. All in a 12x15 room. I don't want to spend a lot of money ( may be 500 or so ). Will buy used.

I've rarely heard vinyl. So why now ? My motivation is two fold ...

1. Many old Indian Classical music is available only in LPs ... and when EMI decides to release on cd they select from two or three LPs and release a couple of tracks ( with all the clicks etc ). Many rare ones are unlikely to be released on LP ( esp. ones not on EMI ).

2. Just curious.

I've no LPs. Can start collecting, though. Esp. on my next visit to India should be able to pick a lot of them, real cheap. I'm just wondering whether in the mean time, I should start assembling something.

So, is it worthwhile to get into vinyl now, if so, can I get something for 500$ ? I'm thinking of some cheap phono stage now and later a proper tube pre with phono stage to replace my passive pre.


 

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DO I HAVE A DEAL FOR YOU !!!!!!, posted on March 4, 1999 at 21:07:47
Vinylly


 
nc

 

Re: Should I get into vinyl now ?!, posted on March 4, 1999 at 23:35:34
Oakroot


 
With your budget of $500 for a phono stage and turntable/arm/cartridge combo your pretty limited - even in the used markets. About your only choice for a turntable is the Musical Hall or sister table the Pro-Ject. You can get an inexpensive NAD, Rotel or Parasound phono unit and spend what's left over for a better cartridge than what will come with either turntable I mentioned.

Don't undersetimate what $100 or so extra outlay for a better cartridge will do for the sound of your entry level analog setup. Good Luck.

 

Re: Should I get into vinyl now ?!, posted on March 5, 1999 at 04:53:25
Jeff B


 
I absolutely agree with Oakroot here. I would definitely go for the Music Hall (or Pro-ject 1). It is the least expensive decent sounding table. It's a simple table, so not much to go wrong and it's decently built. For about $300 including cartridge, it will play those Indian records. For around $100, you can get a NAD phono stage and have some money left for cables if needed. For $400 or so, you should be able to get the NAD 533 table. This table is based on the Rega Planar 2 and comes with the RB250 tonearm and a Goldring cartridge. It will have a little more "oomph" than the Music Hall. This may not be that important to you but Rega tables are considered far and away the best value entry tables on the market.

 

YES!!!!!!!, posted on March 5, 1999 at 05:47:44
Allan


 
I've just made the jump myself, so take what you're about to hear with a newbie grain of salt. My first reaction was a pleasant experience that can best be described as "ease of listening" - it took a couple of hours to realize what I was actually experiencing. The harshness of CD's has been something that I've grown accustomed to and have assumed that that's all there is. NOT TRUE! the very first thing i noticed was a total lack of concentration needed to listen - finding words is difficult here, but "integrated" keeps popping up. There's a fluid coherency to the sound that simply doesn't exist in even the best of my 1100+ cd collection. The 1 and 0 nature of digital sound is absolutely apparent now - the infinitely small transitions of analog cannot be resolved with the cut-and-dry nature of digital unless they extend the resolution to 256 or 512 bit - it will probably always be that way without some major re-thinking of the whole digital sound concept. As I'm writing this, I'm listening to a MONO lp of some old Benny Goodman cuts that were re-pressed in 1979 - found the album at the Salvation Army - and I have to tell you that I'm about to have a complete emotional breakdown from the sheer beauty of these recordings. I was convinced that "being there" isn't possible to attain - but now I'm not so sure! This is truly the most amazing thing (musically) that has happened to me in ten years - which probably means I need to get a real life! And all of this from a 300.00 turntable (Sumiko Pro-Ject 1.2) and a cheapo MM cartridge that came with it. I must admit that I'm far more a music-lover than an audiophile, but if 300 bucks can produce such startling results, I suspect your 500 dollar ballpark will be adequate to give you a glimpse of the potential - GO FOR IT!

 

Re: Should I get into vinyl now ?!, posted on March 5, 1999 at 13:14:29
Big Matt


 
I say yes. When I got a turntable about a year ago I took a big chance. I never heard a decent turntable setup. I was at my friends house who has a cheap Technics that he found in the garbage and he was playing some ZZ top and other classic rock albums from his parents collection. I knew it definately sounded different than the CDs and I have heard that a lot of people have turntables and they say they sound better.

I thought I would take a chance and get a used table. I searched the newsgroups for a few weeks and other websites and eventually found a used Systemdek IIX with AQ PT-5 arm and Sumiko BP for $400. I also didn't have a phono pre so I bought a used Adcom GFP-555mk.II from a guy I worked with for $200. Well, it was the best purchase I have made so far. I did not own any records at that time and went up to a local used record store and picked up a couple. I got everything hooked up and setup as much as I could without any proper setup tools and it sounded great. I even compared to CDs and I wonder I how I listen to CDs at all. Even my friends who didn't really care much about the sound commented on how good the turntable sounded. Well now over a year later I use my turntable all the time and have over 700 records. Another nice thing about records is a lot of the time people will just give them to you. My parents gave me theirs and so have some of my other relatives and friends. Also, I visit garage sales over the summer and pick up lots of records cheap. Some are not very good, but when you only pay $.10 to $.25 for each one it is okay to get a couple that are that great. I also suggest you eventually invest in a vacuum record cleaner such as the VPI HW16.5.

Big Matt

 

Re: Should I get into vinyl now ?!, posted on March 5, 1999 at 14:08:46
Vinyl Junkie


 
Why limit your supply to just CD. Unfortunately good analog and turntable
stuff don't come cheap. Quality and precision cost money. Suggestion, buy
used. You can always buy a used regular pre-amp that has a phono stage
instead of a phone line stage to add to your pre-amp. You can put the tape
out of a regular pre-amp into a line in on your pre-amp. Might look odd
with two pre-amps though, but it will work.

And oh yes, get a nitty gritty or vpi type of record cleaning machine.

 

Re: Should I get into vinyl now ?!, posted on March 5, 1999 at 15:42:22
nataraj


 
Thanks, for the comments. The problem really is that, there is very little (if at all) music released on vinyl now (the kind I listen to). So, it will be only for old records I hope to hunt for and buy.

About the phono stage, since anyway I need to buy a tube pre later on, I might as well just buy a cheap phono now.

Actually, the point is, I'm assuming I can get a lot of old lps. Which may not be the case ... so I don't want to invest (okay, spend ) on the setup and have no records to play ! If things turn out okay, I can upgrade.

 

Re: Should I get into vinyl now ?!, posted on March 5, 1999 at 16:04:29
Oakroot


 
One of the neat things about vinyl is that it often sounds so effortless that you end up listening to and liking other genres of music. Cheers.

 

Re: Should I get into vinyl now ?!, posted on March 5, 1999 at 19:09:17
Monty


 
U.S. Library of Congress archival medium is still VINYL.

 

Re: Should I get into vinyl now ?!, posted on March 5, 1999 at 20:05:18
nataraj


 
Thanks for your comments. Thats surely is a possibility and a good one at that ( actually I do listen to 'western' classical and a bit of jazz ... but then they don't suffer the fate of great music languishing for the want of remastering ! ). I'll look into musichall/project, creek or nad phono and upgrade the cartridge etc. if the 'experiment' goes fine.

 

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