[bob]

On Nov 3, 12:09=A0pm, Jenn wrote:
In article , bob
wrote:

Let's not oversell this. The moment vinyl faced serious competition it
started losing market share.

(Devil's advocate mode on...) =A0The same can be said about CDs.

Of course, and no one would describe the CD market today as
"flourishing." But it's still 50 times the size of the LP market, so
describing the latter that way seems a stretch.

I'd guess there are three main types of consumers interested in vinyl:

1. DJ/turntablists
2. The audiophile "vinyl sounds better" crowd (probably the smallest
of the three)
3. The retro hipster kids

#1 is partially shifting to digital. #2 will always be with us. #3 is
a fad, and fads don't last forever. So my guess is that vinyl will
plateau at some point, but not disappear.

CDs are losing out to lossy mp3s.

So is vinyl.

bob

[Audio Empire]

On Wed, 2 Nov 2011 19:49:26 -0700, bob wrote
(in article ):

On Nov 2, 7:22=A0pm, Audio Empire wrote:

Forty years ago, vinyl was THE source of listener-owned music media. Today it
has to compete with a myriad of other viable music sources. That's a sign of
musical source diversity.

Let's not oversell this. The moment vinyl faced serious competition it
started losing market share. In the 80s, it was losing out not only to
CD, but also to cassettes, for heaven's sake. It was dead. It's now
back from the dead. That's something, but a 2% market share is nothing
to crow about.

It is certainly true that the compact cassette ate deeply into LP
sales starting in the mid-seventies, which just went to show that most
buyers valued convenience over performance (no matter what one thinks
of LP as a music source, I think most knowledgeable audio/music
enthusiasts would have to agree that decent vinyl performance is far
better than was Philips cassette performance - even WITH Dolby B and
HX Pro). I always found commercially available cassettes to sound
lousy. Even on a Nakamichi 1000, they had much more wow and flutter
than an LP, they were noisier than an LP and always sounded
compressed. In short, they were lousy.


snip

All of them. Project. Music Hall, and Rega all make fine performing
"high-end" turntables. There's no market for any other kind.

I wouldn't call them "fine performing." But certain know-nothing
reviewers have anointed them "high-end," and that's been enough.

They have low wow/flutter, the arms are low mass/low friction and
dynamically balanced, and they do a decent job of playing a record. Of
course they don't elicit the last word in resolution from one's vinyl
but they are better than any $89 direct-drive table from the 1980s.

snip

But there are scores of new ones that have taken their place. The absolute
bottom tier is gone, that's true. There are no more cheap mass-market tables
from the likes of Pioneer, Yamaha, Panasonic etc.,

Not those brands in particular, but the low end is still well-
represented. Last time I was in Best Buy (a while ago), the only thing
they carried was a sub-$100 Sony. It's still made, and has plenty of
competition.

Yes, it seems that cheap tables from Numark, Ion, and Sony are still
available, but I must say that I've never seen one in a store. Numark
tables show up from time-to-time in Music stores as "DJ equipment"
however.

Let's not forget that the only thing that kept vinyl alive in the 90s
AT ALL was the DJ market. (And they were not using the hamster-powered
belt drives of today's entry-level audiophile market.) The SL1200 is
out of production, but several copycats are still out there.

That was then, this is now. I never had a DD table that satisfied me,
and I had a number of DD tables that were highly touted at the time. I
don't remember their model numbers but I had the big, expensive
Panasonic SP-10 as well as the top-of-the-line JVC QL-70 (among
others) and I didn't like either. I believe that looking back, my
favorite turntable, and the one I should have kept, was the Empire 598
"Troubadour". It was built like a tank, belt drive, with a sprung
sub-chassis, had a nice big torque-y motor and an excellent mid-mass
arm. My friends and I called it the "great gold idol". it was very
imposing looking. With the Nakaoka heavy, lead-filled record mat
fitted, it gave the most satisfying sound I think I ever heard from LP
(although my later Mapleknoll Athena was close, it's requirement for a
noisy aquarium pump and the concomitant difficulty in keeping the air
properly proportioned between the SLT arm and the 'table's platter,
made it a pain in the arse)

What's really missing today is the p-mount, which brought acceptable
and non-destructive reproduction to the masses.

The indictment of the p-mount concept was that arguably, the highest
quality P-mount cartridge ever sold (to my knowledge - who knows what
was sold in Japan and never made available in the rest of the world)
was the original Sumiko Bluepoint. There was no P-mount Koetsu, or
Dynavector or even a P-mount Shure V-15 available. I'm not saying
that this kind of standardization wasn't a good idea, it certainly
was. But unfortunately, it looks as if it were too little, too late
and only mass-market manufacturers embraced it. I don't remember one
high-quality arm maker who had a P-mount arm. If I'm wrong here and
disremember, please enlighten me.

[Audio Empire]

On Thu, 3 Nov 2011 09:09:21 -0700, Jenn wrote
(in article ):

In article , bob
wrote:

On Nov 2, 7:22*pm, Audio Empire wrote:

Forty years ago, vinyl was THE source of listener-owned music media. Today
it
has to compete with a myriad of other viable music sources. That's a sign
of
musical source diversity.

Let's not oversell this. The moment vinyl faced serious competition it
started losing market share.

(Devil's advocate mode on...) The same can be said about CDs.

In the 80s, it was losing out not only to
CD, but also to cassettes, for heaven's sake.

CDs are losing out to lossy mp3s.



Just another nail in the coffin of audio quality. With the hoi-polloi, it
looks as if convenience trumps quality every time.

[Audio Empire]

On Thu, 3 Nov 2011 11:29:23 -0700, bob wrote
(in article ):

On Nov 3, 12:09=A0pm, Jenn wrote:
In article , bob
wrote:

Let's not oversell this. The moment vinyl faced serious competition it
started losing market share.

(Devil's advocate mode on...) =A0The same can be said about CDs.

Of course, and no one would describe the CD market today as
"flourishing." But it's still 50 times the size of the LP market, so
describing the latter that way seems a stretch.

I'd guess there are three main types of consumers interested in vinyl:

1. DJ/turntablists
2. The audiophile "vinyl sounds better" crowd (probably the smallest
of the three)

Since Hi-end turntables and arms and cartridges make-up the largest sector of
the turntable market, I'd hazard a guess that you are wrong about this. But
even so, it seems to me that you've left out a sector - those with large
record collections.

3. The retro hipster kids

#1 is partially shifting to digital. #2 will always be with us. #3 is
a fad, and fads don't last forever. So my guess is that vinyl will
plateau at some point, but not disappear.

That's a reasonable assumption.

CDs are losing out to lossy mp3s.

So is vinyl.

Then why would the vinyl market be growing?

[Audio Empire]

On Thu, 3 Nov 2011 03:48:29 -0700, UnsteadyKen wrote
(in article ):

Audio Empire wrote...

There's probably
more than a hundred different BRANDS of turntables

There are more than 160 manufacturers by my reckoning.
http://www.btinternet.com/~unsteadyken/turntable.html
Heaven knows how many brands.

It may be that there is less interest in vinyl in the USA now, over here
in Europe it is still relatively healthy.

Some simple statistics to illustrate the point.

USA population: 312 million
TT manufacturers:33

UK population: 62 million
TT manufacturers: 34

Germany population: 81 million
TT manufacturers: 35

Although they may only illustrate why the Euro is going down the pan:-(



There is always that.... The dollar is worthless enough to be considered as
toilet tissue as well 8^).

But your point is well taken. Britain, especially, seems to be a hot bed of
TT activity. Of course the country has always been a nation of small,
specialists manufacturers, so one shouldn't be surprised that a number of
them decided to make turntables. I mean, you can find, in England, not just
one, but several manufacturers who will BUILD you, from scratch, a NEW Jaguar
XK-120 (from 1948) XK-140 (1955) or "C-type" (1951) or "D-type" (1954) or a
brand new XK-E! And several more that will "re-manufacture" an E-type for
you! Find that kind of business in the USA (even for iconic American cars).
This is a uniquely British characteristic (mimicked somewhat by New Zealand).

[bob]

On Nov 3, 6:58=A0pm, Audio Empire wrote:
On Wed, 2 Nov 2011 19:49:26 -0700, bob wrote
(in article ):

On Nov 2, 7:22=3DA0pm, Audio Empire wrote:

All of them. Project. Music Hall, and Rega all make fine performing
"high-end" turntables. There's no market for any other kind.

I wouldn't call them "fine performing." But certain know-nothing
reviewers have anointed them "high-end," and that's been enough.

They have low wow/flutter,

Do they? Last I checked, none of them quoted a meaningful W&F spec.
(Meaningful here means not just a number, but which standard they are
using.) I tend to assume that the absence of a spec is an admission of
weakness, because it almost always is. Atkinson really ought to be
measuring turntables.

snip

The indictment of the p-mount concept was that arguably, the highest
quality P-mount cartridge ever sold (to my knowledge - who knows what
was sold in Japan and never made available in the rest of the world)
was the original Sumiko Bluepoint. There was no P-mount Koetsu, or
Dynavector or even a P-mount Shure V-15 available. =A0I'm not saying
that this kind of standardization wasn't a good idea, it certainly
was. But unfortunately, it looks as if it were too little, too late
and only mass-market manufacturers embraced it. I don't remember one
high-quality arm maker who had a P-mount arm. If I'm wrong here and
disremember, please enlighten me.

No, I think you're right, and I wouldn't expect a high-end maker (of
either tables or carts) to embrace it. But the entry level matters for
the future of the medium, and even the mass marketers didn't embrace
it wholeheartedly. A p-mount arm should have been everyone's entry-
level turntable. You'll get decent sound without a learning curve, and
when you're ready to learn how to match and mount you're own
cartridge, you're ready to upgrade.

Your "too little too late" comment is spot-on. It would have helped a
lot if p-mount carts had been available in the mid 70s.

bob

[bob]

On Nov 3, 7:01=A0pm, Audio Empire wrote:
On Thu, 3 Nov 2011 11:29:23 -0700, bob wrote
(in article ):

I'd guess there are three main types of consumers interested in vinyl:

1. DJ/turntablists
2. The audiophile "vinyl sounds better" crowd (probably the smallest
of the three)

Since Hi-end turntables and arms and cartridges make-up the largest secto=
r of
the turntable market, I'd hazard a guess that you are wrong about this.

I think you're confusing number of makers with sales volume. I'd bet
the Numarks and Sonys way outsell the Pro-Jects and Music Halls. I've
seen Ions for sale at Bed, Bath and Beyond, as well as my local used
record stores.

But
even so, it seems to me that you've left out a sector - those with large
record collections.

True. There's a lot of us old fogies pulling milk crates of vinyl out
of the attic these days. But they're dying off, too, so I'm not sure
they'll be a factor long-term.

bob

[Arny Krueger[_4_]]

"Audio Empire" wrote in message
...

There is a store not 10 miles from me than sells NOTHING but new
turntables
(dozens of brands all the way from $200 for a Chinese built belt drive
unit
with a decent arm and a cartridge of unknown quality (sold by Music Hall)
to
Walker Proscenium selling for more than $60,000.), new turntable
accessories
and records.

I'm a bit surprised, but not really. There are any number of stores that
specialize in Buggy Whips, even one with a web site:

http://www.buggy-whips.com/

Does this mean that the days of the automobile have ended and we are going
to return to animal power? ;-)

But there are scores of new ones that have taken their place. The absolute
bottom tier is gone, that's true.

Actually, the absolute bottom tier, which is the sub-$100 to ca. $100 USB
turntable, has lots of representation. Adjust ca. $100 for inflation and
then compare that to prices in the days of vinyl (ca. 1960-1970) and you
will see what I mean.

There are no more cheap mass-market tables
from the likes of Pioneer, Yamaha, Panasonic etc., if that's what you
mean.

But there are such products from Audio Technica and Sony. Are you
cherry-picking names?

But there are plenty more higher end tables from Japan, China, GB,and
Europe
and even the good ol' USA!

None of which sell in appreciable quantities.

So, given that the population of the US, at least,
200,000,000 40 years ago and is over 300,000,00 now,
what, in FACT, has happened to the number of stores selling
turntables, the number of turntables available, the number
of new LPs being released, the number of new LPs available
and sold, per person 40 years ago vs today?

Not a valid question. Vinyl is no longer the ONLY source of listener owned
music media as it was 40 years ago.

Vinyl sales are still around 1-2% of physical media:

http://76.74.24.142/548C3F4C-6B6D-F7...5E2AB93610.pdf

LP/EP + Vinyl singles = 4.3 million pieces. Total physical sales = 212
million.

Vinyl sales are only about 0.1-0.2% of total sales = 1,726 million pieces.

Pick a number - 2% or 0.2%. It is all best described as "vanishingly small".

If you treat the facts honestly and without prejudice, how
can one say that "LPs are flousriching?"

Because, as a niche market, it is.

That's like saying that the Greater Scaup (a duck-like bird that whose
numbers are only a tiny fraction of what they were) family in my back yard
are doing well.

If you insist that vinyl has to be the
dominate music source in the marketplace in order to be healthy and
flourishing, then we have no common ground to discuss this, because that
is a
false requirement in my estimation.

The absence of common ground comes from an illogical sentimental
attachement, not any technical or commercial fact. You can like what you
like and spend your money as you wish, but I don't have to take at face
value claims that don't stand up to the facts that are before us all.

The sale of vinyl and the attendant
equipment to play it with is large enough to support the number of players
in
that market, and the market segment is growing, not shrinking.

In fact vinyl equipment and media sales have ebbed and flowed in the 20
years since it stopped being a mainstream format. It has doggedly held onto
a tiny numeric segment that is continually being more agressively dwarfed
when the total market for recorded media is considered. We used to talk
about vinyl having a 1-2% market share but if all recordings are considered,
that has dropped to 0.1-0.2%. You can't download vinyl but you can download
a digital file that represents a CD track and have a recording that is
technically and sonically identical to what was on the physical media.

You can play a CD track on a portable player the size of a pack of matches,
but you can't play a LP that way. That's either the bad news or the good
news depending on how you weight sentimentality and tradition against
enjoying mainstream music offerings now.

That's the
criteria for a flourishing market, not some erstwhile market dominance
from a
simpler age when the average music lover had little choice but to buy
vinyl
because there was, essentially, nothing else.

For most people vinyl was something that they tolerated because there was no
competition for it. As soon as there was viable competition the air flowed
out of the vinyl baloon like a bullet had passed through it. That is all
ancient history.

We are now obviously seeing a strong move away from any kind of physical
media at all. I don't buy DVDs from the store that used to be down the
street a few blocks away, I don't go to Blockbuster a few blocks away to
rent them, I rent Blu Rays by web and mail from Netflix and download a few
over the web.


That might work with Harry, but not with me. I'm taking issue only with
your
statement that LP is not flourishing by any criteria you know and your
rather
weak attempts at backing that opinion up.

Using the same logic, the existance of a web store that specializes in buggy
whips means that the buggy whip market is thriving? Thriving comapred to
what?


Well, Dick, your "facts", as stated, seem to lack current market
knowledge.
Statements like "...how many of those three brands of turntables at Best
Buy
would you let within 10 feet of any of your LPs?" shows that you don't
seem
to know that today's record decks, even the cheap ones are very good with
fine performing arms and low-friction bearings. So, with seemingly
outdated
"facts" and some of the assumptions that you seem to have made, above,
you'll forgive me for taking your conclusions on this issue with a grain
of
salt.

Actually, I've seen technical tests of many of these low cost turntables,
and most turn out to be the groove busters that we fear that they we

http://www.knowzy.com/Computers/Audi...rntabl es.htm

On this page there is a particularly amusing item called: "One Cheap USB
turntable. Many brand names" How many of these aliases have been namelessly
hyped here? The technical description after thorough testing is:

"All plastic construction, ceramic cartridge with inferior sound,
accelerates wear by applying serious needle pressure, skipped frequently in
(our) tests."

[Audio Empire]

On Thu, 3 Nov 2011 16:39:59 -0700, bob wrote
(in article ):

On Nov 3, 6:58=A0pm, Audio Empire wrote:
On Wed, 2 Nov 2011 19:49:26 -0700, bob wrote
(in article ):

On Nov 2, 7:22=3DA0pm, Audio Empire wrote:

All of them. Project. Music Hall, and Rega all make fine performing
"high-end" turntables. There's no market for any other kind.

I wouldn't call them "fine performing." But certain know-nothing
reviewers have anointed them "high-end," and that's been enough.

They have low wow/flutter,

Do they? Last I checked, none of them quoted a meaningful W&F spec.
(Meaningful here means not just a number, but which standard they are
using.) I tend to assume that the absence of a spec is an admission of
weakness, because it almost always is. Atkinson really ought to be
measuring turntables.

I've a friend who recently bought a Pro-Ject RM 1.3 ($499) and if it has wow
and flutter it is below the threshold of audibility even on classical piano
with lots of sustains, I hear no speed problems. This is one of those tables
that sports a "high-density fibre" platter - it isn't even acrylic. But the
arm seems to be an OK "S" design and his Grado Reference Platinum1 cartridge
sounds fine in it it even comes up to speed fairly quickly.

snip

The indictment of the p-mount concept was that arguably, the highest
quality P-mount cartridge ever sold (to my knowledge - who knows what
was sold in Japan and never made available in the rest of the world)
was the original Sumiko Bluepoint. There was no P-mount Koetsu, or
Dynavector or even a P-mount Shure V-15 available. =A0I'm not saying
that this kind of standardization wasn't a good idea, it certainly
was. But unfortunately, it looks as if it were too little, too late
and only mass-market manufacturers embraced it. I don't remember one
high-quality arm maker who had a P-mount arm. If I'm wrong here and
disremember, please enlighten me.

No, I think you're right, and I wouldn't expect a high-end maker (of
either tables or carts) to embrace it. But the entry level matters for
the future of the medium, and even the mass marketers didn't embrace
it wholeheartedly. A p-mount arm should have been everyone's entry-
level turntable. You'll get decent sound without a learning curve, and
when you're ready to learn how to match and mount you're own
cartridge, you're ready to upgrade.

Your "too little too late" comment is spot-on. It would have helped a
lot if p-mount carts had been available in the mid 70s.

Yes, I'm not sure how much it would have helped; the LP was bound to go down
before the onslaught of the CD. And I'm not sure how much it would have done
toward holding off the gaining popularity of cassettes by the
convenience-over-quality set of consumers, but it might have made things a
lot easier for the mass-market turntable set of the time.

[Arny Krueger[_4_]]

"Audio Empire" wrote in message
...
On Wed, 2 Nov 2011 19:49:26 -0700, bob wrote

I think most knowledgeable audio/music
enthusiasts would have to agree that decent vinyl performance is far
better than was Philips cassette performance - even WITH Dolby B and
HX Pro).

I was surely of that opinion back when such things mattered.

I always found commercially available cassettes to sound
lousy. Even on a Nakamichi 1000, they had much more wow and flutter
than an LP, they were noisier than an LP and always sounded
compressed. In short, they were lousy.

Agreed.

Of course, so were LPs. Of course only people who had heard well made high
speed tapes (e.g. 7 1/2 ips and higher) knew about it.

snip

All of them. Project. Music Hall, and Rega all make fine performing
"high-end" turntables. There's no market for any other kind.

I wouldn't call them "fine performing." But certain know-nothing
reviewers have anointed them "high-end," and that's been enough.

They have low wow/flutter,

They have up to six magnitudes more FM distortion than even mediocre
digital, and the FM distortion is often at similar frequencies.

the arms are low mass/low friction and dynamically balanced, and they do a
decent job of playing a record.

They are not appreciably better than the better products that we had in the
late 70s and early 80s. There has been no new signficant technical
innovations since then.

Of course they don't elicit the last word in resolution from one's vinyl
but they are better than any $89 direct-drive table from the 1980s.

If you set the bar low enough.

Also the above is an assertion with no reliable technical support.
Measurements? Reliable listening tests?

snip

But there are scores of new ones that have taken their place. The
absolute
bottom tier is gone, that's true. There are no more cheap mass-market
tables
from the likes of Pioneer, Yamaha, Panasonic etc.,

Not those brands in particular, but the low end is still well-
represented. Last time I was in Best Buy (a while ago), the only thing
they carried was a sub-$100 Sony. It's still made, and has plenty of
competition.

Yes, it seems that cheap tables from Numark, Ion, and Sony are still
available, but I must say that I've never seen one in a store.

It's all about what stores you visit.

They are all that I see in stores, including Best Buy. They are all over
the web. They are sold in ads in Sunday suppliments.

Numark tables show up from time-to-time in Music stores as "DJ equipment"
however.

There is plenty of evidence that at its peak, DJ LP sales dwarfed the
audiophile market.

Let's not forget that the only thing that kept vinyl alive in the 90s
AT ALL was the DJ market. (And they were not using the hamster-powered
belt drives of today's entry-level audiophile market.) The SL1200 is
out of production, but several copycats are still out there.

That was then, this is now. I never had a DD table that satisfied me,

That's all about your prejudices. Got any technical evidence that there is a
categoric and/or inherent technical problem with DD turntables?

[Arny Krueger[_4_]]

"Audio Empire" wrote in message
...
On Thu, 3 Nov 2011 03:48:29 -0700, UnsteadyKen wrote

Of course the country has always been a nation of small,
specialists manufacturers, so one shouldn't be surprised that a number of
them decided to make turntables. I mean, you can find, in England, not
just
one, but several manufacturers who will BUILD you, from scratch, a NEW
Jaguar
XK-120 (from 1948) XK-140 (1955) or "C-type" (1951) or "D-type" (1954) or
a
brand new XK-E! And several more that will "re-manufacture" an E-type for
you!


Find that kind of business in the USA (even for iconic American cars).
This is a uniquely British characteristic (mimicked somewhat by New
Zealand).


Finding that kind of business in the USA is no problem. Here's the facts
about just one tiny segment that is duplicated several times over for other
iconic cars:

Cobra Replica Kit Manufacturers

JBL MotorsportsThe company we went with. They have an excellent website that
includes detailed chassis data and even maintenance guidelines. I'd like to
see more replica companies follow suit.

Actual business behind the name: Goins Motorsports located in Jay Ok.

ERA Replica AutomobilesAnother excellent website with lots of details about
their cars (although not much performance data).

Located in New Britain, CT

Factory Five RacingThe most popular Cobra replica due to its low price.
Using a used Mustang 5.0L donor car, an FFR roadster can be built for under
$20,000.

Located in Wareham MA

Kirkham MotorsportsIf you're looking for the most authentic replica and
you're not scared by the high price, this is the one to get. They even have
aluminum bodies available

Located in Provo, UT

[Audio Empire]

On Fri, 4 Nov 2011 03:51:27 -0700, bob wrote
(in article ):

On Nov 3, 7:01=A0pm, Audio Empire wrote:
On Thu, 3 Nov 2011 11:29:23 -0700, bob wrote
(in article ):

I'd guess there are three main types of consumers interested in vinyl:

1. DJ/turntablists
2. The audiophile "vinyl sounds better" crowd (probably the smallest
of the three)

Since Hi-end turntables and arms and cartridges make-up the largest secto=
r of
the turntable market, I'd hazard a guess that you are wrong about this.

I think you're confusing number of makers with sales volume. I'd bet
the Numarks and Sonys way outsell the Pro-Jects and Music Halls. I've
seen Ions for sale at Bed, Bath and Beyond, as well as my local used
record stores.

I don't think so. But then, I really don't know for sure.

But
even so, it seems to me that you've left out a sector - those with large
record collections.

True. There's a lot of us old fogies pulling milk crates of vinyl out
of the attic these days. But they're dying off, too, so I'm not sure
they'll be a factor long-term.

bob

Those dying "old fogies", like me, will likely leave their record
collections to someone. So the records will be around even if we "old fogies"
won't be.

[bob]

On Nov 4, 5:37=A0pm, "Arny Krueger" wrote:

Actually, I've seen technical tests of many of these low cost turntables,
and most turn out to be the groove busters that we fear that they we

http://www.knowzy.com/Computers/Audi.../Sample_Audio_...

Interesting page, though someone really needs a lesson or two in
effective communication of information. Too bad they're focused solely
on the low end of the market. Once they get some meaningful
independent measurements posted, there will actually be more
information available about these cheapo units than about most of the
high end offerings out there.

bob

[Audio Empire]

On Fri, 4 Nov 2011 14:39:53 -0700, Arny Krueger wrote
(in article ):

"Audio Empire" wrote in message
...
On Wed, 2 Nov 2011 19:49:26 -0700, bob wrote

I think most knowledgeable audio/music
enthusiasts would have to agree that decent vinyl performance is far
better than was Philips cassette performance - even WITH Dolby B and
HX Pro).

I was surely of that opinion back when such things mattered.

I always found commercially available cassettes to sound
lousy. Even on a Nakamichi 1000, they had much more wow and flutter
than an LP, they were noisier than an LP and always sounded
compressed. In short, they were lousy.

Agreed.

Of course, so were LPs. Of course only people who had heard well made high
speed tapes (e.g. 7 1/2 ips and higher) knew about it.

Since I MADE 15ips, 1/2 track tapes of a well known symphony orchestra and
recorded such illuminaries as Aaron Copland (conducting), Pierre Fournier,
Fredericka Von Staddt, Phillipe Entremont, and Rudolf Firkusny, etc. I knew
how much better master tapes sounded than records, Still, records sounded
pretty damn good under the right circumstances especially considering the
unlikely process by which they were made.

snip

All of them. Project. Music Hall, and Rega all make fine performing
"high-end" turntables. There's no market for any other kind.

I wouldn't call them "fine performing." But certain know-nothing
reviewers have anointed them "high-end," and that's been enough.

They have low wow/flutter,

They have up to six magnitudes more FM distortion than even mediocre
digital, and the FM distortion is often at similar frequencies.

Compared to other turntables, not compared to digital. Lets compares apples
with other apples here.

the arms are low mass/low friction and dynamically balanced, and they do a
decent job of playing a record.

They are not appreciably better than the better products that we had in the
late 70s and early 80s. There has been no new signficant technical
innovations since then.

Nobody is saying that there are. The only improvements are in material
technology. Arms weren't made from carbon fiber in the 70's and 80's and
platters weren't cast/machined acrylic, they were aluminum (and sometimes
glass).

Of course they don't elicit the last word in resolution from one's vinyl
but they are better than any $89 direct-drive table from the 1980s.

If you set the bar low enough.

Also the above is an assertion with no reliable technical support.
Measurements? Reliable listening tests?

Why? It wouldn't change your mind. All I'm saying is today's $399 /$499
turntables provide decent performance for the money. The fact that most come
with a cartridge pre-installed means that they are plug-n-play for the buyer
and the cartridges match the arms for resonance, the arms seem to have decent
bearings and well designed geometry, and they play records with a result that
is surprisingly good for the money and certainly better than a $99 NUMark or
Ion.

snip

But there are scores of new ones that have taken their place. The
absolute
bottom tier is gone, that's true. There are no more cheap mass-market
tables
from the likes of Pioneer, Yamaha, Panasonic etc.,

Not those brands in particular, but the low end is still well-
represented. Last time I was in Best Buy (a while ago), the only thing
they carried was a sub-$100 Sony. It's still made, and has plenty of
competition.

Yes, it seems that cheap tables from Numark, Ion, and Sony are still
available, but I must say that I've never seen one in a store.

It's all about what stores you visit.

True. I have no reason to visit the kinds of stores that would sell such
junk. You certainly don't find those 'tables in audio stores, but you might
find them in music stores (especially the NuMarks) who cater to the "DJ"
market.

They are all that I see in stores, including Best Buy. They are all over
the web. They are sold in ads in Sunday suppliments.

The only Best Buys I've been in have Magnolia Stereo stores in them. They
don't sell that crap.

Numark tables show up from time-to-time in Music stores as "DJ equipment"
however.

There is plenty of evidence that at its peak, DJ LP sales dwarfed the
audiophile market.

I wouldn't know about that as I have never had any any reason to keep up with
that market, I just know it exists from looking through pro sound equipment
catalogs such as those from Swee****er, ZZSounds, Musicians Friend, etc.

Let's not forget that the only thing that kept vinyl alive in the 90s
AT ALL was the DJ market. (And they were not using the hamster-powered
belt drives of today's entry-level audiophile market.) The SL1200 is
out of production, but several copycats are still out there.

That was then, this is now. I never had a DD table that satisfied me,

That's all about your prejudices. Got any technical evidence that there is a
categoric and/or inherent technical problem with DD turntables?

No, but I always thought that belt drive tables simply sounded better, It's
been many years since I owned my last DD 'table, so I can't categorize my
objections to individual tables anymore. I will say that of all the DD
tables I had, the Panasonic SP-10 was by far the best and my Empire
Troubadour 598 might have been the best turntable I've ever owned - PERIOD.

[Audio Empire]

On Fri, 4 Nov 2011 14:37:14 -0700, Arny Krueger wrote
(in article ):


Actually, I've seen technical tests of many of these low cost turntables,
and most turn out to be the groove busters that we fear that they we


http://www.knowzy.com/Computers/Audi...udio_Clips_Fro

m_USB_Record_Player_Turntables.htm

On this page there is a particularly amusing item called: "One Cheap USB
turntable. Many brand names" How many of these aliases have been namelessly
hyped here? The technical description after thorough testing is:

"All plastic construction, ceramic cartridge with inferior sound,
accelerates wear by applying serious needle pressure, skipped frequently in
(our) tests."


Actually we're talking at cross purposes here. This is not the kind of
turntables I'm talking about. I agree that these are junk and I wouldn't let
one of my records in the same room with any of them, never mind that I would
actually play a record with one! I suspect that the excuse for such junk as
these "USB" tables is that if you can play the record once and digitize it,
then you will not need to play it again. That said, who cares if it tears the
record a new one while being transfered to digital? 8^)

I never even considered junk like this when I was discussing today's low end
record decks. To me a low-end record deck starts at about $400. No record
owner I have ever known would even contemplate such a piece of crap as these
tables in your above URL. Fact is since I don't "play" in that arena, I
wasn't even aware that such junk still existed in the marketplace. That said,
I take back what wrote earlier about the low-end tier being gone, and I have
to say that it's still with us and today's $99 record decks are far poorer
than the $99 decks of the late '70's and 1980's.

[Audio Empire]

[ Moderator's note: This subthread is barely about audio now, so
unless someone has something to add that is much more audio oriented,
this is the end. -- deb ]

On Fri, 4 Nov 2011 14:41:16 -0700, Arny Krueger wrote
(in article ):

"Audio Empire" wrote in message
...
On Thu, 3 Nov 2011 03:48:29 -0700, UnsteadyKen wrote

Of course the country has always been a nation of small,
specialists manufacturers, so one shouldn't be surprised that a number of
them decided to make turntables. I mean, you can find, in England, not
just
one, but several manufacturers who will BUILD you, from scratch, a NEW
Jaguar
XK-120 (from 1948) XK-140 (1955) or "C-type" (1951) or "D-type" (1954) or
a
brand new XK-E! And several more that will "re-manufacture" an E-type for
you!


Find that kind of business in the USA (even for iconic American cars).
This is a uniquely British characteristic (mimicked somewhat by New
Zealand).


Finding that kind of business in the USA is no problem. Here's the facts
about just one tiny segment that is duplicated several times over for other
iconic cars:

Cobra Replica Kit Manufacturers

JBL MotorsportsThe company we went with. They have an excellent website that
includes detailed chassis data and even maintenance guidelines. I'd like to
see more replica companies follow suit.

Actual business behind the name: Goins Motorsports located in Jay Ok.

ERA Replica AutomobilesAnother excellent website with lots of details about
their cars (although not much performance data).

Located in New Britain, CT

Factory Five RacingThe most popular Cobra replica due to its low price.
Using a used Mustang 5.0L donor car, an FFR roadster can be built for under
$20,000.

Located in Wareham MA

Kirkham MotorsportsIf you're looking for the most authentic replica and
you're not scared by the high price, this is the one to get. They even have
aluminum bodies available

Located in Provo, UT



I know all about all of them, and that's not what I'm talking about. These
are kit cars and even the ones they build for you (turnkey) are just their
kits and not real Cobras by any stretch of the imagination. They all have
fiberglass bodies and drive trains made up of parts from other cars (old
"donor" '90's Mustang suspensions and rear axles being among the most
popular) The companies I'm talking about build REAL Jags with bodies made
from the original Jaguar dies, they use real XK engines, and many are
indistinguishable (except by an expert ) from a a real vintage Jag.

If the companies you mention were making "replica" audio equipment they''d be
making Marantz 10B tuners with plastic facias, IC "FM/AM tuner " chips, and a
fake oscilloscope screens.