Hifi

[(o)(o)]

Gripped a Pro-Ject 1Xpression with Ortofon 2M Silver and nice acrylic platter.



Timewarp situation it's been a good few years since I had a deck.

It's mental as I have a very high-spec digital front end. Just miss the tactility of records and the complete fucking hassle of it all.

Any other hipsters dipping their toes into the analogue world.. ?

[oktup]

I got given a Dual 505-2 in poor shape a while back. Found a new cover, replaced the belts and a new cartridge and bought a few cheap LPs to replace the ones I sold year's ago. The Dual's a bit static-y but plays okay. Since then it has since been replaced with my old man's Audio Technica AT-LP120-USB. Just wish I still had all my old LPs.

[skab]

Bah. Forget this noisy vinyl rubbish. Real analogue is only on proper reel-to-reel tape.

[(o)(o)]

Bah. Forget this noisy vinyl rubbish. Real analogue is only on proper reel-to-reel tape.

I did enjoy a highly tweaked Revox A77! Even more faff though honestly.

Plus not enough..



..for my liking.

@oktup I feel you wrt to Vinyl. I sold my collection when the prices collapsed too. Several £k in value today probably got £100-200 for the lot. Never considered it would make such a comeback. Called that wrong! I'm seeing CDs are slowly crawling out of the bargain bin too. I think people are starting to see the ephemeral value and personal association of digital data for what it is, clammering again for physical media.

[Portland]

Nice. Need to get a new cart for my cutting edge (30 some year old) 505/3.

Also need to hit the sweet spot of cost vs quality on a 5.1 setup and new 3d 4k blu Ray player. Tending towards Panny blu Ray, Denon box and those Diddy Wharfedale speakers.

[skab]

Bah. Forget this noisy vinyl rubbish. Real analogue is only on proper reel-to-reel tape.

I did enjoy a highly tweaked Revox A77! Even more faff though honestly.

Plus not enough..



..for my liking.

Yes. That. That exactly is what completely turns me off. Always hated this disturbing crackle, I was more of a tape guy.

It's been nearly 10 years ago now that I bought (or rather stole, it was that good of a deal!) my Studer A80, a 100kg lump of steel and aluminium. I have a few priced possessions that I will never give away, this is one of them. Just beautiful.

[(o)(o)]

Yes. That. That exactly is what completely turns me off. Always hated this disturbing crackle, I was more of a tape guy.

One mans euphonic distortion is another mans poison.

I'm currently running the Pro-Ject to an Azure 851D DAC via Bluetooth.

It's been nearly 10 years ago now that I bought (or rather stole, it was that good of a deal!) my Studer A80, a 100kg lump of steel and aluminium. I have a few priced possessions that I will never give away, this is one of them. Just beautiful.

It's epic engineering!

Lusted after a Studer CD player for a while. Completely impractical, but just look at it:



Last one on ebay sold at £3k for parts!

[skab]

I'm currently running the Pro-Ject to an Azure 851D DAC via Bluetooth.

Oh no, you're spoiling the analogue goodness by using this devilish digital stuff

It's epic engineering!

Lusted after a Studer CD player for a while. Completely impractical, but just look at it:



Last one on ebay sold at £3k for parts!

About everything Studer made was great (and people know it, so prices tend to be really high). They also made some great cassette players that were built like tanks as well (and now cost a fortune, unfortunately).

I grew up with old tape machines, so I started to look for a nice machine back then. This old video from 2009 was was hooked me on the A80. Basically it was the gentle tape handling that blew me away, not how it sounds or anything. This is a professional studio machine, it's build to be as hi-fi as you can get. If it had "a sound" it wouldn't be good at all. Something the "audophiles", of all people, don't get at all.



The A80s shown here are basically the type of machine I got, minus the monitor bridge on top and the BBC mods (faders bottom right). The modular construction is great, you can swap out a broken card and you're back on track. Some of the control cards contain a lot of classic 74xx logic ICs, that's as hi-tech as it gets, so everything is incredibly easy to fix. That doesn't mean that it wouldn't need fixing, right now my A80 needs a couple minutes to lock onto the proper tape speed, when it's cold it plays way too fast. But I'm sure a session with a scope and the thorough documentation will be all that's needed to find the culprit. So it is also good fun if you're a tinkerer

[VNVObit]

Still have a large vinyl collection (albeit most of it is still in another country) and invested recently in a Sony PSHX500 so I could rip them easily (it has a built in ADC unit and samples at 24/192 , WAV files, or you can produce DSD files if you prefer - read there isn't much of a difference between them so tend to go WAV->ALAC).

In terms of DACs - couldn't justify something as expensive as the CA851D just use a Mojo Chord connected to Raspberry Pi as a listening station (my family prefer me to use headphones).

Do have CA amp (351) a CA streamer (Stream Magic v2) but don't really have it set up anywhere I can use (so gathering a little dust at present). Hopefully have some more room once we've done some decluttering and I can commandeer a little space for amps etc.

I'm currently running the Pro-Ject to an Azure 851D DAC via Bluetooth.

Oh no, you're spoiling the analogue goodness by using this devilish digital stuff

with skab on this as you are going turntable>ADC>DAC>speakers - no way you could connect direct to amp and bypass the DAC?

[rowan]

I was quite tempted by one of the earlier Pro-ject's which got a good write up for sound quality at a not-too-silly price.
However I was put off by the large exposed rubber band drive which a lot of people said failed after a bit of time and also was easily knocked off.

That looks as if it may be direct drive? Or at least concealed belt.

However, I don't see the other must-have for me.. Pitch control for a good +/- 8%.

I was going to bite the bullet & get a 2nd hand SL1210 but I'm overly nervous of getting a knackered one, based on how most will have been abused. Also price would probably be too high for how much I'd use it.

[skab]

However, I don't see the other must-have for me.. Pitch control for a good +/- 8%.

That doesn't sound like you need it for "normal" listen What do you need that for?

[phattslagg]

Yeah, I spunked a load of dosh on a new turntable last year: Rega Planar 3 with Neo power supply and an AT95 w/ paratrace stylus.

Not to mention the vinyl spending spree

[rowan]

However, I don't see the other must-have for me.. Pitch control for a good +/- 8%.

That doesn't sound like you need it for "normal" listen What do you need that for?

Amongst other discs, I have a bunch of old jungle records and even though I don't intend to try mixing any more, I still like to speed up the older stuff or sometimes slow down the newer.

[Deckard]

I do like a vertical record deck



although I still have my 1210s I learnt to dj on from around 1994.....

[venusian]

Not much into vinyl and record players but I'm loving the light-soaked discs in this thread.