Split from "Non-Linn products that perform well regarding Tune Method"
Tremendous info Thomas. I've never heard the famous Rega P3, but want to more than ever now. I can't resist asking you what were the failing 'LP12 killers' you've heard in the shop? There are just so many high-end desks out there now and they all seem to get rave reviews. Names like VPI, Michelle, and Avid keep cropping up as strong opposition to the Sondek, but it sounds like the press have a unique criteria as usual - i.e. it's new, so it must be great! I've heard so many people report that the SMEs are particularly analytical and lifeless, but it would still be fun to compare one head-to-head with an lP12. I presume you have come across turntables that can better the LP12 regarding specific Hi-Fi elements (i.e. direct drives like a Technics or Garrard with better base control), but which never better the Sondek musically?
I think working for a dealer must be quite rewarding at times when you get a chance to hear what this stuff is really like.
Failing LP12 Killers
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I had planned on answering this a while back but I lost track of it. I just remembered about and had to go searching to find it - I guess I need a way to mark posts I've read but want to respond to later. :)Charlie1 wrote:tremendous info Thomas. I've never heard the infamous Rega P3, but want to more than ever now. I can't resist asking you what were the failing 'LP12 killers' you've heard in the shop? There are just so many high-end desks out there now and they all seem to get rave reviews. Names like VPI, Michelle, and Avid keep cropping up as strong opposition to the Sondek, but it sounds like the press have a unique criteria as usual - i.e. it's new, so it must be great! I've heard so many people report that the SMEs are particularly analytical and lifeless, but it would still be fun to compare one head-to-head with an lP12. I presume you have come across turntables that can better the LP12 regarding specific Hi-Fi elements (i.e. direct drives like a Technics or Garrard with better base control), but which never better the Sondek musically?
I think working for a dealer must be quite rewarding at times when you get a chance to hear what this stuff is really like.
Anyway, I have had a few "high-end" tables in the shop and have set up a number more at customer houses. I have yet to hear one that I have enjoyed as much as even a modest LP12! Some of the tables I have experienced include various VPIs - including 2 HR-X models, Schue, Origin Live, Nottingham Analogue (smoked by a Rega at half the price), Michell, Well Tempered (which impressed us by actually being better than a Rega 3) and most recently, an SME 20.
The story of the SME 20 is most interesting. A good customer who owns a Linto and Klimax electronics went astray a few years back and bought an SME 20 with SME IV.VI tonearm and a Dynavector XV-1 MC cartridge. The setup runs about $21,000US. He had read the positive press on the Keel and Ekos SE and wondered whether he might want to go back to an LP12 as he always liked the looks better. He had me go to his house to fine tune his SME by adjusting the torque on the bolts and I brought along our demo LP12SE/Akiva. After adjusting his SME we did a few quick A/Bs. He heard enough of a difference to decide he will borrow our LP12 for a more extended listen mentioning that it usually takes him a while to make up his mind. What I heard, however, surprised me and made the idea of proper music reproduction much clearer.
We first did a couple of A/Bs with an Ella Fitzgerald record. I immediately noticed that her voice and the instruments were a fair bit easier to follow on the LP12. in addition the percussion was clearer and the bass had more power and texture. Everything just sounded better played and more enjoyable. I then played a Norah Jones record I had brought along as I am quite familiar with it and heard more of the same, music that was easier to get into and made you want to move to it. Nothing really new here, the typical kind of differences I tend to expect in this kind of comparison - although this was my first direct comparison with the SME. The next A/Bs were the ones that really drove the whole tunefulness thing home. He got out a John Coltrane record titled Africa/Brass. I like John Coltrane and own a number of his records but this one was new to me. I put it on the SME and noticed right off that the sax didn't flow that well but then the brass came in! This didn't sound good at all, it was total cacophony - just a bunch of noise. I was al ready to write the record off as one of those really avant-garde pieces that I just couldn't get into. Then I played it on the LP12 and WOW, it was really good! The sax had flow and rhythm to the playing and when the brass came in it sounded like a perfect depiction of a bunch of wild animals in an African rainforest. It all of a sudden made sense and I decided right there that I had to get this record! I couldn't believe the difference. I put it back on the SME and it was cacophony again - just a mess of sound, literally. Put it back on the Linn again and it was music, and very good music at that!
I have to say that this comparison dramatized the importance of a piece of equipment being able to play the tune in a way that I hadn't experienced in a while.
I devoured that post with relish :) Great to hear your experiences - Fantastic! Part of the reason I enjoyed it so much is because, until discovering this forum, I'd always felt that I should have made the effort to compare my LP12 against the competition with all their exotic designs and rave reviews, but dragging my deck around the country for A-B dem's never appealed much - I was lucky not to I think. And there is so much comment on the web about how the LP12 compares with other decks, but very little from people who's opinion I trust. That was a rare treat so thank you once again Thomas.
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Music Lover
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The ending is, as yet, unknown. The customer is supposed to borrow our LP12SE for an extended, in-home listen but has been too busy to do so yet. I have a hard time believing he won't make the right decision :) once exposed to it for a few days.Music Lover wrote:Great story Thomas.
But we all have to know...did it have a happy ending?
Another, and shorter, story just came to me about a similar case. In 1979 a record came out self-titled "The Roches" by the 3 Roche sisters and produced by Robert Fripp of King Crimson fame. The album is very interesting and features some unusual vocal harmonies and some very humorous tunes.
At the time we used it in our shop for demos quite a bit and quite enjoyed it. One of my associates got a call from a friend who was then a writer for Absolute Sound magazine and as they were discussing sound and music he said that he didn't like the Roches album because, are you ready, they sang out of tune! :mrgreen: I believe he was using some highly-rated turntable of the day. My friend informed him that they sang perfectly in tune (which they do) but that you had to play the record on an LP12 if you wanted to hear it!
The interesting thing is that one of the reasons that we liked to use it for demo was that it did indeed sound like they were singing out of tune on other turntables of the day like the Denon direct drives that we also carried or the big direct drive Mitch Cotter monstrosity that the magazines loved.
At the time we used it in our shop for demos quite a bit and quite enjoyed it. One of my associates got a call from a friend who was then a writer for Absolute Sound magazine and as they were discussing sound and music he said that he didn't like the Roches album because, are you ready, they sang out of tune! :mrgreen: I believe he was using some highly-rated turntable of the day. My friend informed him that they sang perfectly in tune (which they do) but that you had to play the record on an LP12 if you wanted to hear it!
The interesting thing is that one of the reasons that we liked to use it for demo was that it did indeed sound like they were singing out of tune on other turntables of the day like the Denon direct drives that we also carried or the big direct drive Mitch Cotter monstrosity that the magazines loved.
OK, It is a sunny and warm Saturday here in Ann Arbor, MI - easily one of the nicest days yet this year. So here I am sitting at work with nobody coming in the store because who wants to shop for Hi-Fi when they can be outside on such a nice day? (And who can get away, even if they wanted to, when the wife wants help with the gardening?)
With this slow state of affairs I had time to write a lengthy tome on the WD NAS. Since things show no sign of picking up soon I thought I should also relate a good analog story from earlier this week on this topic.
One of my regular turntable setup customers (who sadly doesn't own an LP12 but instead seems to cycle among an ever weirder collection of turntables) came to me recently with an interesting request. He wanted to bring me a Thorens TD124 setup owned by a friend of his and drop it off for a week so I could clean it up, fine tune it and adjust the torques (which he is a big believer in having heard the improvements on several different turntables he has owned). I said I would be glad to take care of this for him and he brought it to me about two weeks ago.
When the TD124 arrived I couldn't have been more happy. It turned out to be almost exactly the kind of TD124 setup Art Dudley enthused about a while back in Stereophile. This TD124 had been rebuilt by one of the premier German or Swiss companies specializing it this (I don't remember the name). It was fitted into a thick and solid, but also somewhat light plinth. It also had a 12" arm as preferred by its devotees, in this case the well-regarded SME 3012R. Finally it was sent here including an Ortofon SPU Meister elliptical cartridge - basically de rigueur for this kind of setup.
So I set to work taking apart, cleaning and lubricating as required all the moving parts of the turntable - and believe me it needed it. (For one thing someone in the past had been a bit too liberal in the application of black grease to some of the bearings which proceeded to fling it all over the inside of the turntable!) Finding that the rubber idler wheel rubbed slightly on the coupling shaft at 45 RPM I found a small washer of just the right size to fit under the small plastic washer the idler wheel sits on that brought it to the perfect height. Once the motor/platter system itself was working optimally I set about optimizing the rest of the turntable system. I used a shortened spare Linn ground wire to ground the chassis to the tonearm ground (as done in LP12s) and cleaned the arm cable contacts. Then I went to work on the arm/cartridge. The arm was missing the anti-skate system as some parts had been lost so I fabricated a new anti-skate arm from a heavy paper clip (it actually looked quite official and worked perfectly) and used an extra thread and weight we had in our spares. With that in place I adjusted the cartridge alignment, arm height, the tracking force and the anti-skating force to suggested levels. Then I fine tuned these and the torques on the arm board bolts and the alignment adjustment screws by ear as normal.
Once complete it looked good and everything was about as optimized as you could get it. So now it was time to listen to it! I will start out by saying that it actually sounded fairly good - there wasn't the really unmusical sound you immediately get with some other highly regarded turntables. You could actually follow the tune pretty well and it sounded well balanced from a frequency response point of view. So no glaring problems. Time for a comparison. Using the same setup I mentioned in the NAS post: KK/1/D, Solos and Vienna Klimt the Music speakers, fed by a Uphorik I listened to the TD124 setup. As I'd noticed on the test bench system it was balanced and you could follow the tune reasonably well. It did seem to have a fairly potent bass as some have suggested. Then over to the LP12, also through the Uphorik and it was all over. The LP12 easily crushed the TD124 with a much more musical presentation. It easily had as much power in the bass but instrumental texture and the quality of musicianship was on a substantially higher level on the LP12. These sounded like better musicians who were having more fun playing and the interplay between them was much more evident. In comparison the Thorens sounded much like a tape that has been played way too many times with a soft and blurred quality to virtually everything coming off the record.
Now before people assume I was being unfair comparing the 40ish year old TD124 to a tricked out new LP12 I should probably mention that it was a stock Majik LP12 used in this comparison (our LP12 SE is still awaiting a Radikal/1 from Linn). So the cartridge on the Thorens sells for about half of the complete Majik LP12 package! Both were on Quadraspire shelves to try and keep a level playing field. It really just wasn't funny how much more musical, powerful and just plain fun it was to listen to the LP12 in comparison. I would like to have had a chance to compare the TD124 to a Rega 3 just to see which of those would win but I ran out of time before the customer came to pick it up. (While it was not his turntable he was quite pleased with the work and thought it sounded about right - the original owner should have it back soon and I look forward to hearing what he thinks after he has a chance to listen to it.) I think the battle between the TD124 and the Rega would be a lot closer (Duh!) and I wouldn't want to bet on which would win but I also wouldn't be surprised if it were the P3.
So "Another one bites the dust!" Anybody have a Garrard 301 they want me to setup and tweak?
With this slow state of affairs I had time to write a lengthy tome on the WD NAS. Since things show no sign of picking up soon I thought I should also relate a good analog story from earlier this week on this topic.
One of my regular turntable setup customers (who sadly doesn't own an LP12 but instead seems to cycle among an ever weirder collection of turntables) came to me recently with an interesting request. He wanted to bring me a Thorens TD124 setup owned by a friend of his and drop it off for a week so I could clean it up, fine tune it and adjust the torques (which he is a big believer in having heard the improvements on several different turntables he has owned). I said I would be glad to take care of this for him and he brought it to me about two weeks ago.
When the TD124 arrived I couldn't have been more happy. It turned out to be almost exactly the kind of TD124 setup Art Dudley enthused about a while back in Stereophile. This TD124 had been rebuilt by one of the premier German or Swiss companies specializing it this (I don't remember the name). It was fitted into a thick and solid, but also somewhat light plinth. It also had a 12" arm as preferred by its devotees, in this case the well-regarded SME 3012R. Finally it was sent here including an Ortofon SPU Meister elliptical cartridge - basically de rigueur for this kind of setup.
So I set to work taking apart, cleaning and lubricating as required all the moving parts of the turntable - and believe me it needed it. (For one thing someone in the past had been a bit too liberal in the application of black grease to some of the bearings which proceeded to fling it all over the inside of the turntable!) Finding that the rubber idler wheel rubbed slightly on the coupling shaft at 45 RPM I found a small washer of just the right size to fit under the small plastic washer the idler wheel sits on that brought it to the perfect height. Once the motor/platter system itself was working optimally I set about optimizing the rest of the turntable system. I used a shortened spare Linn ground wire to ground the chassis to the tonearm ground (as done in LP12s) and cleaned the arm cable contacts. Then I went to work on the arm/cartridge. The arm was missing the anti-skate system as some parts had been lost so I fabricated a new anti-skate arm from a heavy paper clip (it actually looked quite official and worked perfectly) and used an extra thread and weight we had in our spares. With that in place I adjusted the cartridge alignment, arm height, the tracking force and the anti-skating force to suggested levels. Then I fine tuned these and the torques on the arm board bolts and the alignment adjustment screws by ear as normal.
Once complete it looked good and everything was about as optimized as you could get it. So now it was time to listen to it! I will start out by saying that it actually sounded fairly good - there wasn't the really unmusical sound you immediately get with some other highly regarded turntables. You could actually follow the tune pretty well and it sounded well balanced from a frequency response point of view. So no glaring problems. Time for a comparison. Using the same setup I mentioned in the NAS post: KK/1/D, Solos and Vienna Klimt the Music speakers, fed by a Uphorik I listened to the TD124 setup. As I'd noticed on the test bench system it was balanced and you could follow the tune reasonably well. It did seem to have a fairly potent bass as some have suggested. Then over to the LP12, also through the Uphorik and it was all over. The LP12 easily crushed the TD124 with a much more musical presentation. It easily had as much power in the bass but instrumental texture and the quality of musicianship was on a substantially higher level on the LP12. These sounded like better musicians who were having more fun playing and the interplay between them was much more evident. In comparison the Thorens sounded much like a tape that has been played way too many times with a soft and blurred quality to virtually everything coming off the record.
Now before people assume I was being unfair comparing the 40ish year old TD124 to a tricked out new LP12 I should probably mention that it was a stock Majik LP12 used in this comparison (our LP12 SE is still awaiting a Radikal/1 from Linn). So the cartridge on the Thorens sells for about half of the complete Majik LP12 package! Both were on Quadraspire shelves to try and keep a level playing field. It really just wasn't funny how much more musical, powerful and just plain fun it was to listen to the LP12 in comparison. I would like to have had a chance to compare the TD124 to a Rega 3 just to see which of those would win but I ran out of time before the customer came to pick it up. (While it was not his turntable he was quite pleased with the work and thought it sounded about right - the original owner should have it back soon and I look forward to hearing what he thinks after he has a chance to listen to it.) I think the battle between the TD124 and the Rega would be a lot closer (Duh!) and I wouldn't want to bet on which would win but I also wouldn't be surprised if it were the P3.
So "Another one bites the dust!" Anybody have a Garrard 301 they want me to setup and tweak?
I have to agree with hcl on this one! I sold the Dual CS505 as well as the Rega Planar 2, Planar 3 and LP12 back in the late 70s and early 80s. Even the Rega 2 was easily more musical than the Dual.hcl wrote:That has be a broken Rega to be beaten by a Dual (or a Dual on steroids :-)Linntek wrote:@Thomas
Funny about the P3.
I've compared P3 (Planar 3) againt a Dual CS505-3 back in the late 80's.
The Rega got beaten really bad (same cart).
As far as I know there has only been one upgrade since then.
Also there have been two upgrades to the P3 since the late 80s: the P3 2000 with updated motor mount and drive circuit and the P3/24 with a bigger update to the motor and drive system, and upgrades to the plinth and arm.
I wouldn't under-estimate the P3 as it has outperformed many a supposed LP12 competitor.
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Tony Tune-age
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Thanks for the informationThomasOK. A friend of mine has the Thorens TD124, and wanted to know what can be done to improve its sonic performance. Other than proper deck adjustment, good tonearm and cartridge selection...it can't be upgraded too much - eh?ThomasOK wrote:Now before people assume I was being unfair comparing the 40ish year old TD124 to a tricked out new LP12 I should probably mention that it was a stock Majik LP12 used in this comparison (our LP12 SE is still awaiting a Radikal/1 from Linn). So the cartridge on the Thorens sells for about half of the complete Majik LP12 package! Both were on Quadraspire shelves to try and keep a level playing field. It really just wasn't funny how much more musical, powerful and just plain fun it was to listen to the LP12 in comparison. I would like to have had a chance to compare the TD124 to a Rega 3 just to see which of those would win but I ran out of time before the customer came to pick it up. (While it was not his turntable he was quite pleased with the work and thought it sounded about right - the original owner should have it back soon and I look forward to hearing what he thinks after he has a chance to listen to it.)
Tony Tune-age
Other than making sure the idler and belt are OK and everything is properly lubed, I just add the ground wire and get the torques set properly. I'm sure there is a whole cottage industry out there offering upgrades for the TD124 but I have only had a couple come through here and from what I've seen most people prefer to keep them pretty much stock. Fancy, and often quite expensive, plinths seem to be popular out there but again the plinths I've seen have been fairly basic.Tony Tune-age wrote:Thanks for the informationThomasOK. A friend of mine has the Thorens TD124, and wanted to know what can be done to improve its sonic performance. Other than proper deck adjustment, good tonearm and cartridge selection...it can't be upgraded too much - eh?
If anyone wants to bring one of these by for me to play with I'm game!lindsayt wrote:I've been disappointed with the SME 3012R arm that I've heard. I thought it was an un-tuneful arm.
It'd be interesting to compare a Thorens TD 124 with an Ekos or Ekos SE against a similarly equiped LP12. Or failing that, a 124 with a Fidelity Research FR64s arm or a Breuer or a Graham Phantom.
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Tony Tune-age
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Thanks a million ThomasOK. I'll tell my friend to conduct some research, and see if any of the upgrades for the Thorens TD-124 are worth while. They probably aren't as straight forward as the Sondek upgrades.ThomasOK wrote:Other than making sure the idler and belt are OK and everything is properly lubed, I just add the ground wire and get the torques set properly. I'm sure there is a whole cottage industry out there offering upgrades for the TD124 but I have only had a couple come through here and from what I've seen most people prefer to keep them pretty much stock. Fancy, and often quite expensive, plinths seem to be popular out there but again the plinths I've seen have been fairly basic.Tony Tune-age wrote:Thanks for the informationThomasOK. A friend of mine has the Thorens TD124, and wanted to know what can be done to improve its sonic performance. Other than proper deck adjustment, good tonearm and cartridge selection...it can't be upgraded too much - eh?
Tony Tune-age
Well, unlike the Linn upgrades they aren't going to come from Thorens but from 3rd party companies. As such they should be treated with some trepidation, just like Rega "upgrades" from other companies most of which don't actually upgrade a Rega.Tony Tune-age wrote:Thanks a million ThomasOK. I'll tell my friend to conduct some research, and see if any of the upgrades for the Thorens TD-124 are worth while. They probably aren't as straight forward as the Sondek upgrades.ThomasOK wrote:Other than making sure the idler and belt are OK and everything is properly lubed, I just add the ground wire and get the torques set properly. I'm sure there is a whole cottage industry out there offering upgrades for the TD124 but I have only had a couple come through here and from what I've seen most people prefer to keep them pretty much stock. Fancy, and often quite expensive, plinths seem to be popular out there but again the plinths I've seen have been fairly basic.Tony Tune-age wrote:Thanks for the informationThomasOK. A friend of mine has the Thorens TD124, and wanted to know what can be done to improve its sonic performance. Other than proper deck adjustment, good tonearm and cartridge selection...it can't be upgraded too much - eh?
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Tony Tune-age
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springwood64
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Linntek wrote:@Thomas
Funny about the P3.
I've compared P3 (Planar 3) againt a Dual CS505-3 back in the late 80's.
The Rega got beaten really bad (same cart).
As far as I know there has only been one upgrade since then.
I made that exact comparison and bought the Dual in the early 90s
: D
Pete
Linn Axis, Slipsik, Källa, Boazu, Espeks
Linn Axis, Slipsik, Källa, Boazu, Espeks
This post was written up in response to somebody on the Linn forum trying to decide between a Linn Basik/Axis or a newer turntable. The Rega tables were recommended as well as some others and the Technics 1200 also was mentioned. As some have even touted the 1200 as being better than a LP12 (joining a large and distinguished club of turntables touted as better than a Linn despite the fact they didn't come close) I figured this might be an appropriate place for this post. Besides I thought you would find it amusing and i didn't really want to start another thread for it, although "Failing Rega 3 Killers" does have a nice ring to it! ;-)
While I still haven't had the opportunity to listen to a Technics SL1200 I do have something to report. Just a few days ago I received in for consignment a Technics SL1700 MKII. It has an older AT cartridge on it and the arm lift no longer works but otherwise is in good condition. I wondered how close this was to an SL1200 so I did some research on Vinyl Engine, AudioKarma and other sites and found out some interesting information. It turns out that the SL1700 MKII and the SL1200 MKII are close brothers - very close. They share the same tonearm and adjustable height tonearm mount, the same platter, the same motor and the same Quartz lock motor electronics! The differences: the SL1700 MKII has an automatic arm return feature and the platter and arm are on a spring suspended subchassis (compared to the solid base SL1200 MKII). The spring system is nowhere near as good as what Linn has but does give some isolation which some claim is a sonic improvement. Regardless, it is obvious these two tables are quite similar.
So given this opportunity I decided to fix up the SL1700 the best I could and give it a critical listen. As I mentioned the table appeared to be in good shape so I looked at the service manual and gave it a good going over. I did not need to mess with the electronics (I wasn't worried about the non-working cueing/arm return mechanism) so I just did basic maintenance. I applied a few drops of original Linn bearing oil to the main bearing (recommended about every 2000 hours and likely not done in years) and checked the speed. With the Linn speed checker it appeared to be as accurate as a typical Lingo LP12 looks. The arm had no free play and was very good in terms of horizontal friction however vertical friction was a bit high. I was able to make a very slight adjustment to the vertical bearing that freed it up nicely yet did not introduce any free play I could feel. I have to say that I was overall impressed by the arm as not only did it have good bearings with no free play, it also had very close to the correct angle to the headshell and a pretty accurate counterweight scale (both of which are usually wrong on typical Japanese tables). The anti-skate scale was too low but that is very common even on some quite good arms.
Having gotten the table and arm working properly I fitted a Rega Elys 2 cartridge to it (the same cartridge we have on our demo Rega RP3 (I'm sure you can see where this is going). I fine-tuned the cartridge alignment and arm height, properly torqued the cartridge to the headshell and dialed in the approximate tracking and anti-shating forces. I also replaced the rubber mat with a Linn felt mat (as the platter is pretty dead I didn't feel there would be any advantage to the thicker Rega mat). For the final fine tuning I used listening tests to determine the proper orientation of the felt mat and the musically optimum tracking and anti-skating forces. Having made the Technics sound as good as possible it was time to pull it off the test bench and connect it into a system for some comparisons. In order to give the Technics every advantage I put it on a Quadraspire wall shelf while I put a Rega RP3/Elys2 on top of a CD player. Bothe were fed into a Lejonklou Slipsik5.1 phono stage into a Linn Majik DS-I and to Paradigm Studio 60 floorstanding speakers connected with Linn K20 and Linn Silvers.
And so we compared the two turntables starting with the SL1700 MKII. It was immediately apparent to both of us listening that the Rega was a vastly more musical turntable. The Technics immediately made surface noise much more noticeable and annoying and even from some of the pops on the record you could hear that it had limited bass extension and power compared to the Rega. But more important was what was happening to Muddy Waters (the "Folk Singer" album - we used the first track "My Home is in the Delta"). The first time I switched over to the Rega I thought it was slower but switching back I could tell it was the same speed. It was just that the music, a laid-back blues piece, sounded much more relaxed on the Rega. The vocals and instruments just flowed in a very natural way and the musicians played in a very together pace with great expression in the guitar, bass, drums and vocals. Indeed there is a place about a minute in where he increases the volume of his vocal to give greater emphasis to the line and it literally gave me goosebumps when I herd it on the RP3. Playing the same piece on the SL1700 was a completely different experience. The bass player and the drummer not only had less power they couldn't seem to keep the same tempo and they were also out of time with the guitar. The guitar itself (indeed all the instruments really) sounded flatter with less expression and reduced dynamics. When the guitar was strummed hard instead of hearing more power and resonance it sounded harsh and yet dull. The Rega allowed you to hear much more of the articulation of vocals and strings and the overtones and decay of the notes were quite a bit more natural. The drums had more impact, more resonance and the cymbals each had their own unique tone. All in all this was a major smackdown of the Technics SL1700 MKII by the Rega RP3. On the Technics you could hardly wait to make the switch, on the Rega you wanted to just keep listening.
But the Rega is a new table that sells for $1095US with the Elys 2 cartridge. So maybe we should try something more modest against the Technics. So this time I brought over the $445 Rega RP1 with its OEM Ortofon OM5e cartridge (included in the RP1 price but normally selling for $55 compared to the Elys 2 at $295 in the Technics). So how did this comparison go? Pretty much the same s the last one except not to the same degree. The RP1 sounded like a less expressive, slightly muted and a bit compressed version of the RP3. It still did all the things mentioned above better than the Technics - less surface noise, deeper and more powerful bass, a more natural pace and structure to the music and more real and natural sounding instruments and voices - just not as much better as the RP3. The RP1 was still enjoyable to listen to whereas the Technics wasn't. It just didn't keep up with the RP3 which certainly sounded more like great musicians playing together in the room. Overall the RP1 was closer to the RP3 than it was to the Technics and was certainly enjoyable and musical listened to by itself. But it took the RP3 to bring on the goosebumps.
So all said and done I really can't recommend the Technics for its musical playback capabilities. Unless the SL1200 is in a completely different league, and I have no reason to believe that it is, you would be much better off musically with a Rega RP1 which also has the advantage of being easily upgradeable, in a number of steps, to a level near that of the RP3. And going up to an RP3 doesn't put you in a whole new ballpark compared to SL1700 MKII, it puts you in a whole new ballpark in a different, and more alive, city! Should I get my hands on an actual SL1200 I'll repeat the comparison using it. But as it sits now I have to recommend the Regas as easily the better way to go.
While I still haven't had the opportunity to listen to a Technics SL1200 I do have something to report. Just a few days ago I received in for consignment a Technics SL1700 MKII. It has an older AT cartridge on it and the arm lift no longer works but otherwise is in good condition. I wondered how close this was to an SL1200 so I did some research on Vinyl Engine, AudioKarma and other sites and found out some interesting information. It turns out that the SL1700 MKII and the SL1200 MKII are close brothers - very close. They share the same tonearm and adjustable height tonearm mount, the same platter, the same motor and the same Quartz lock motor electronics! The differences: the SL1700 MKII has an automatic arm return feature and the platter and arm are on a spring suspended subchassis (compared to the solid base SL1200 MKII). The spring system is nowhere near as good as what Linn has but does give some isolation which some claim is a sonic improvement. Regardless, it is obvious these two tables are quite similar.
So given this opportunity I decided to fix up the SL1700 the best I could and give it a critical listen. As I mentioned the table appeared to be in good shape so I looked at the service manual and gave it a good going over. I did not need to mess with the electronics (I wasn't worried about the non-working cueing/arm return mechanism) so I just did basic maintenance. I applied a few drops of original Linn bearing oil to the main bearing (recommended about every 2000 hours and likely not done in years) and checked the speed. With the Linn speed checker it appeared to be as accurate as a typical Lingo LP12 looks. The arm had no free play and was very good in terms of horizontal friction however vertical friction was a bit high. I was able to make a very slight adjustment to the vertical bearing that freed it up nicely yet did not introduce any free play I could feel. I have to say that I was overall impressed by the arm as not only did it have good bearings with no free play, it also had very close to the correct angle to the headshell and a pretty accurate counterweight scale (both of which are usually wrong on typical Japanese tables). The anti-skate scale was too low but that is very common even on some quite good arms.
Having gotten the table and arm working properly I fitted a Rega Elys 2 cartridge to it (the same cartridge we have on our demo Rega RP3 (I'm sure you can see where this is going). I fine-tuned the cartridge alignment and arm height, properly torqued the cartridge to the headshell and dialed in the approximate tracking and anti-shating forces. I also replaced the rubber mat with a Linn felt mat (as the platter is pretty dead I didn't feel there would be any advantage to the thicker Rega mat). For the final fine tuning I used listening tests to determine the proper orientation of the felt mat and the musically optimum tracking and anti-skating forces. Having made the Technics sound as good as possible it was time to pull it off the test bench and connect it into a system for some comparisons. In order to give the Technics every advantage I put it on a Quadraspire wall shelf while I put a Rega RP3/Elys2 on top of a CD player. Bothe were fed into a Lejonklou Slipsik5.1 phono stage into a Linn Majik DS-I and to Paradigm Studio 60 floorstanding speakers connected with Linn K20 and Linn Silvers.
And so we compared the two turntables starting with the SL1700 MKII. It was immediately apparent to both of us listening that the Rega was a vastly more musical turntable. The Technics immediately made surface noise much more noticeable and annoying and even from some of the pops on the record you could hear that it had limited bass extension and power compared to the Rega. But more important was what was happening to Muddy Waters (the "Folk Singer" album - we used the first track "My Home is in the Delta"). The first time I switched over to the Rega I thought it was slower but switching back I could tell it was the same speed. It was just that the music, a laid-back blues piece, sounded much more relaxed on the Rega. The vocals and instruments just flowed in a very natural way and the musicians played in a very together pace with great expression in the guitar, bass, drums and vocals. Indeed there is a place about a minute in where he increases the volume of his vocal to give greater emphasis to the line and it literally gave me goosebumps when I herd it on the RP3. Playing the same piece on the SL1700 was a completely different experience. The bass player and the drummer not only had less power they couldn't seem to keep the same tempo and they were also out of time with the guitar. The guitar itself (indeed all the instruments really) sounded flatter with less expression and reduced dynamics. When the guitar was strummed hard instead of hearing more power and resonance it sounded harsh and yet dull. The Rega allowed you to hear much more of the articulation of vocals and strings and the overtones and decay of the notes were quite a bit more natural. The drums had more impact, more resonance and the cymbals each had their own unique tone. All in all this was a major smackdown of the Technics SL1700 MKII by the Rega RP3. On the Technics you could hardly wait to make the switch, on the Rega you wanted to just keep listening.
But the Rega is a new table that sells for $1095US with the Elys 2 cartridge. So maybe we should try something more modest against the Technics. So this time I brought over the $445 Rega RP1 with its OEM Ortofon OM5e cartridge (included in the RP1 price but normally selling for $55 compared to the Elys 2 at $295 in the Technics). So how did this comparison go? Pretty much the same s the last one except not to the same degree. The RP1 sounded like a less expressive, slightly muted and a bit compressed version of the RP3. It still did all the things mentioned above better than the Technics - less surface noise, deeper and more powerful bass, a more natural pace and structure to the music and more real and natural sounding instruments and voices - just not as much better as the RP3. The RP1 was still enjoyable to listen to whereas the Technics wasn't. It just didn't keep up with the RP3 which certainly sounded more like great musicians playing together in the room. Overall the RP1 was closer to the RP3 than it was to the Technics and was certainly enjoyable and musical listened to by itself. But it took the RP3 to bring on the goosebumps.
So all said and done I really can't recommend the Technics for its musical playback capabilities. Unless the SL1200 is in a completely different league, and I have no reason to believe that it is, you would be much better off musically with a Rega RP1 which also has the advantage of being easily upgradeable, in a number of steps, to a level near that of the RP3. And going up to an RP3 doesn't put you in a whole new ballpark compared to SL1700 MKII, it puts you in a whole new ballpark in a different, and more alive, city! Should I get my hands on an actual SL1200 I'll repeat the comparison using it. But as it sits now I have to recommend the Regas as easily the better way to go.