Vinyl Asylum: REVIEW: Sumiko Pro-ject 1.2 Turntables by Joe Blow

Ever since my Marantz TT2200 died (RIP), I have been anxious to purchase my first "real" turn table. I had read allot about the problems of "plastic" 'tables here and other places and I can confirm first hand the old Marantz (despite the relatively hi end name among mass market stuff) suffered from every one of them. Rumble was awful and very pronounced on this direct drive table and the lack of an azimuth adjustment pretty much garanteed my channel balance would forever be skewed to the left. Still, I lived with it for 10+ years thinking it was just the way records were. Now that I have experienced first hand what a real 'table is capable of doing, I now see how completely wrong my views of vinyl have been.

My budget was limited to $300 (+/-) which dictated I stay with the bottom of the high-end arena, and given my setup it really didn't make much sence to do more anyway. I also considered the Music Hall MMF-2/2.1 ($299) and the NAD533 ($349). I shyed away from the NAD when I read about the hum problems with Grado cartridges on Rega tables, and since the NAD is a slightly cheapend Rega 2 it follows this table would hum too (I love the Grado sound so a Grado cartridge is a must). The MMF was eliminted when my dealer (Needle Doctor) explained all the differences of the MMF design. Basically, the Pro-ject 1.2 is substantially more table easilly justifying the $20 increase in price.

The Pro-ject arrived from Needle doctor well packed in a double box. Good thing too as the outer box had been punctured and apperently dropped several times. Inside I found my dissembled Pro-ject totally undamaged, no thanks to UPS. Like a kid at Christmas I put it all together anxious to here what I have been missing.

It all went together easy enough but the manual doesn't cover all the tools that are supplied with the 'table. Included are two alignment protractors, one made of plastic that doubles as a VTF force gage. The manual does not reference the force function of this alignment tool at all, prefering to fall back on the standard "balance arm, set weight to zero" method. The second tool is a cardboard protractor that fell out of the manual when I opened it. The manual does not reference this protractor at all, which is based on the standard two point method. There is also a plastic do-dad which I assume is what the manual refers to as the speed changing device (or something like this anyway), but there is no picture of it so I can't tell for sure.

When it came time to assemble the plater onto the sub platter, I noticed the underside was riddled with 3/8" sized holes drilled partially through all on one side. I'm guessing this is how they balance the platter after it is cast. Given the quantity of holes I have to question the factory's ability to keep this process under control. Not a particularly re-assuring thing to see in a precision piece of equipment. Anyway I drop the platter on without the belt at first and give it a nice slow spin. It went for 30 seconds or so with no desernable decrease in speed before I grew tired of watching it and stopped it. Wow!

After everything was assembled, I removed the included Sumiko Oyster cartridge and installed a Grado Prestige Red in it's place. The Oyster is a cheap cartridge (Sumiko's bottom end) with a conical diamond and tracks at a heafty 2.3 grams. I would rather it hadn't come with any cartrdige, but I'll keep the Oyster as it may be usefull for handling some of the damaged kiddie records I'm transfering to CDR.

I started off trying to use the plastic protractor as dictated by the manual, but I found it exceedingly difficult to use. The points are so close together I question the accuracy, and the parallel lines are far enough away that it is difficult to tell if the cartridge is straight anyway. I put it aside in short order and used a home made protractor that uses the same points as the included cardboard tool. I got VERY lucky and had the cartridge aligned in about 5 minutes.

A quick visual of Azimuth and VTA showed the azimuth to be way out of wack. To adjust azimuth you loosen a set screw just behind the tone arm bearings and the entire tone arm tube rotates. Problem is the azimuth screw is underneath the "limb" where the anti-skate weight hangs on. It is very difficult to get to and you have to turn the screw at an angle. I managed this adjustment (barly being able to turn the screw). A quick recheck of alignment and all was good!

I rig up the anti-skate and notice it's pretty hokey. It's a weight on a string afair (which isn't what I find hokey) but there are only three settings which prohibits any kind of precise adjustment. Each notch corresponds to a range of tracking force published in the manual. You pick the notch corresponding to your cartridge and hope for the best. It was REALLY disapointing to see this on an otherwise extrememly flexable and adjustable tone arm.

Onto the rack it goes. I piered through my collection looking for a good test disk. It had to meet two criteria -- be something I really wanted to hear, and be something that could really show off the new goods. I ended up picking two disks, Al Stewart's "Time Passages" and "The Year Of The Cat", which sounded extremely good even on the old Marantz, and was something I hadn't listened to in a long time to boot.

I powered on the amp and table, did a quick hum test. I was disapointed to find there is a very audible hum starting with the volume control at about 12:00. I put my ear on the plinth and could hear only very soft scraping noises which I assume will deaden as the bearings break in.

I anxiously put the record on and played it. All I can say is wow! Even the first play the new cart gave a very nice overall warm sound and outstanding vocals I have come to expect from Grado, and fortunately the output is high enough that the volume at 9:00 is quite sufficient which pushes the hum to inaudible levels.

The Sumiko and Grado are a wonderfull combination. I closed my eyes and just listened in total awe for about an hour and a half (opening them to flip records, of course) and really began to appreciate some of what I read here about what a good analog system is capable of. Saxaphones, strings, and acoustic guitars sounded extremely life like, dare I say, a touch of air and transparancy to them. With my eye's closed if somebody had said Al was right in front of me I probably would have believed them. A really quick rumble test by pushing the volume up between tracks found only hiss and a few ticks (and the afore mensioned hum). Absolutely no disernable rumble. A real hoot! Since this initial debut, I have listened to several other LPs with equally stunning results.

I have also been in contact with another Pro-ject 1.2 owner who frequents the asylum and we have discovered, besides what I noticed about my platter, another potential issue with Pro-ject quality control. This issue revolves around the wire used to hold anti-skate counter weight. Figure 4 of the manual gives dimensions of the setup where the wire loop (where the string is thread) is, relative to tone arm pivot, 38mm to the left and 37mm to the rear. This person's measured 50mm to the left. I measured mine and found it to be 30mm. Given the roughness of the anti-skate adjustment it's hard to say if this deviation really matters, but I bent mine anyway to 35mm.

This is definately a table worthy of consideration for those looking to upgrade their plastic tables, or looking for a modest priced good performer to re-enter the vinyl market.

REVIEW: Sumiko Pro-ject 1.2 Turntables Review by Joe Blow at Audio Asylum