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RE: If you only had a $1,000, what would you buy?

Posted by Time_Stands_Still (A) on May 15, 2017 at 13:59:55

In Reply to: If you only had a $1,000, what would you buy? posted by Terry on May 15, 2017 at 13:01:05:

There are a few nice turntables in the $1000 range. You will likely get a lot of POV's and as such will be all subjective. Let me tell you of my experience.

I have had a number of good turntables from entry level new models to a few classic higher quality Made In Japan direct drives of the classic era to my latest purchase, a new Rega Planar 3 in gloss black I bought without a Rega cartridge as I already had a newer Denon DL-110 in the wings to put on instead.

LOVE IT! LOVE IT! LOVE IT!. Quite simply the best turntable I have owned. After watching Michael Fremer's 5 part video series of his tour with Roy Gandy of Rega Research's factory (THREE TIMES I WATCHED IT) I found myself nodding yes to Roy's and his engineer's philosophy on turntable design and manufacturing. It all makes sense to me. I had to buy a new Rega Planar 3 even though my current rig was 100% satisfying. For me in Canuck Bucks it's like near $1200 Cdn. and even though in the turntable world that is not uber expensive today, it is a bit so for a guy with a beer budget. BUT I HAVE NO REGRETS! I SIMPLY ADORE THIS TURNTABLE AND HOW WELL IT PLAYS BACK RECORDS!

No, Rega's are not the easiest to fuss around with. No simple VTA adjustments, not adjustable feet, no glitzy froo froo. Rega's are built to the ideas of RIGID, STIFF and LIGHT! You can buy after market VTA adjusters or shims if you like. But Rega's are engineered to be mostly plug n play to their design ideals.

The Denon DL-110 is a bit taller than Rega cartridges and as such on the RB-330 arm cause it to sit tail low. It did not make much a difference to my enjoyment of LP playback IMO, but my cure was simple. I found 9 small metal flat washers, superglued them in stacks 3 high giving them a 2 +mm lift. I drew the tone arm mount screws up and slipped these 3 stacks of washers under each point of the base and then screwed the arm back down. It leveled the arm with the DL-110 to satisfaction and kept IMO a solid arm mount base. I am not going to swap out my DL-110 and I do not feel need to tweak VTA wise each LP. The DL-110 on the Planar 3 SOUNDS SWEET, AIRY, A GREAT SOUND STAGE TO MY EARS ON MY AUDIO SYSTEM!

If you are going to be a tweaker notably on VTA, Well Rega may not be the best choice but Michel Engineering makes a more on the fly VTA adjuster that one can buy and use on new Rega's and use if you like.

I just rather play good clean vinyl records on my Planar 3 and just enjoy the listening.

Dollar for dollar, especially if you agree with Roy Gandy's ideals on turntables the Planar 3 is a hard to beat in the $1000 Us range.

My only beef is their dust covers are too shallow and raising the tone arm to fit the DL-110 with proper VTA meant that dust cover touches counterweight once closed. I FIXED THAT TOO!

I found a black piece of rubber about 3mm thick. I cut with a ruler and sharp craft knife 4 pieces that measure about 3mm x 3mm x 10mm and carefully super glued them to the four corners of my dust cover raising it above the counter weight now. One note the rear tabs were glued about 1cm forward to not interfere with the dust cover opening and closing.

I wish Rega would just make their dust cover about 1 cm. taller in manufacturing.

Edits: 05/15/17 05/15/17 05/15/17

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