Edgewound

"Of course the arm doesnt have any bias adjustments - so it cant be any good then...." ---------------- You are the last person I would have expected to misrepresent the meaning of my comments with such an innuendo. Since you wish to introduce linear trackers to the frey, I am of the opinion that they are more trouble than they're worth. A very good idea in theory, but certainly fraught with their own set of problems. Not worth the effort, unless you reside in a "clean room", or are fortunate enough to have money to burn.

---------------- On 5/16/2005 9:45:35 PM Piranha wrote: I am now thinking about a Basis 1400 too. OK guys, Basis 1400 vs. VPI Scout and Scoutmaster? Don't the Japanese make any decent tables? ---------------- You're a funny guy!

---------------- On 5/16/2005 1:49:23 PM 3dzapper wrote: "Nice post and that is a very beautiful arm." Thanks. Jazman made me buy it. He said to the effect "If you buy a Rega RB-300 for that Bellagio, I'm gonna come out to RI and whack you on the side of the head with a 2X4". Not that a 2X4 would bother me. I just wanted to spare him the expensive air fare. Besides, at the price I was offered, it was a no brainer. Rick ---------------- Just for the record (ha ha) Rega does make more than just the RB-300.

...in other words. You can adjust the VTA on a Rega arm all you wish, it's just not "on the fly" or practical for each disc played, and it takes a little more effort. And yes, it's not "factory".

---------------- On 5/16/2005 12:56:44 PM 3dzapper wrote: "If I had to choose, I'd forgo the VTA before the bias. With the VPI your cartridge/tracking force options will be more limited, UNLESS you don't mind wearing out one side of the groove at a more accelerated rate than the other, not to mention the uneven stylus wear you're guaranteed with this type of arm." Why bother setting antiskate bias when you can't even hear what was originally recorded on the LP? With improperly set VTA you are ethier going to wind up with boomy bass and no highs or shrill highs with loose flubby bass. I use this Bluenote B-5 Signature. tone arm. It has a bias compensation system with weights and line similiar to an SME. Bluenote recommends that it not be used except in extreme cases as they feel it degrades the audio. I don't, but I do take my time and effort to set the VTA properly. Not annaly for each record though, that's too much of a PITA. From the manual under "Troubleshooting": Antiskate; Description: The tone arm tends to be attracted to the center of the record during play; Remedy: We suggest not to use the Anti-Skating system on such tone arm but eventually contact your dealer to have the anti skate wire weighted on one side to tie to the small screw inserted on the olive shaped top of the arm wand." (Pardon the syntax, the makers are from Italy) http://forums.klipsch.com/idealbb/files/B5Sig.jpg" border="0"> Rick ---------------- I acknowledged that the lack of VTA on the Regas was a negative, BUT that it could easily and economically be corrected. I did not intend to suggest that VTA adjustment was in any way unimportant. I was simply saying that if forced to choose between the two, I would take bias, since the VTA issue could be solved to some degree with the selection of an appropriate cartridge, if one did not wish to use shims or an aftermarket solution. Not quite so simple for bias. Nice post and that is a very beautiful arm.

---------------- On 5/15/2005 9:26:50 AM coda wrote: Randy, congrats on your new set up, you sound like a happy guy, don't toss your CDs out quite yet, you may run into a better player one day. . As for the groove wear discussion, perhaps there is a tire analogy, with the wear taking place inside the tread. The analogy was to illustrate the destructive effects of something intended to work in a "straight line" not doing so. The out of spec front suspension "pulling" is the arm with no or incorrect bias correction. You can let the tire be the stylus, or representative of a groove's wall, whichever you prefer. Have fun and make the outer tie-rod end the stylus, and the tire's edges the record's playing surface, if you wish. Actually, the road surface could more accurately represent the stylus, it's just the forces at work here that this was intended to illustrate. It's an easy visualization, if you think about it. Finding flaws with my analogy still doesn't change the fact that that front ends and tone arms that "pull" cause damage.

---------------- On 5/16/2005 9:34:57 AM seti wrote: ---------------- On 5/16/2005 9:26:40 AM spaaaz wrote: Oh no! dont you dare say that cords make a difference.they will tear you apart ---------------- Oh crap I forgot that was one of the flame bait topics. Please I was only curious and not wanting to cause a riot this time. I like to try things out for myself regardless of what other people say. Just think if I had been a newbie and hanging out on a bose forum and only listened to other peoples opinions and not the speakers I could have ended up with bose and solid state. I haven't said I heard a difference because I haven't however the argument that I could tell a difference in image quality with different cables would prove not all cables are created equal. That being said I haven't proven anything it could very well have been that the monitor resorted to default settings. ---------------- If you don't care what other people say, then why did you ask what others have done or thought? You'd be hard pressed to convince me that you didn't know what you were getting started.

---------------- On 5/16/2005 7:22:45 AM seti wrote: I have a friend that works in a hospital and when they are getting rid of medical equipment he saved the power cords. He finally has all the power cords he wants and gave me a few but I told him I didn't think it would make any difference to the sound and the jury is still out on that one for me. He said if I didn't think that power cords made any difference that I should hook them up to a computer monitor and see if I notice a difference in the picture quality. I tried this and I had to admit the picture looked better with the medical grade power cords. Just for the sake of argument I am going to have a friend swap power cables without telling me which is which but I doubt I'll notice. I must admit I was very suprised that power cords made a difference in picture quality in fact had I read this on the internet I would have used PWK phrase BS. Has anyone else tried this? ---------------- Why is it that this subject, which has been beaten to death on every audio forum on the internet, continues to be resurected? It leads to nowhere, like sand amps vs. tubes, or SET vs. push-pull. Why waste the space and bandwidth with a topic that will only lead to childish name calling, and result in nothing? Opinions on wire are like politics and religion, and have no useful place on an audio forum as large and diverse as this one. It will only lead to an enormous waste of time and flaming. In my OPINION, the only useful discussions on wire pertain to it's usee in the repair and rebuilding of equipment, where it's characteristics do make a difference (like is it flexible enough to fit, or is it adequately sheilded?) etc. Do a search on ANY forum, and you'll get all the palaver you could ever possibly want to read, about power cords and wire.

---------------- On 5/15/2005 9:26:50 AM coda wrote: Randy, congrats on your new set up, you sound like a happy guy, don't toss your CDs out quite yet, you may run into a better player one day. . As for the groove wear discussion, perhaps there is a tire analogy, with the wear taking place inside the tread. For added perspective, the info below was pulled from a site that deals with vintage 78s, Groove Wear It's the curse of all records. A diamond, sapphire or old Victrola steel needle grinding up against a vinyl or shellac coating embedded with dirt, and the comparatively soft surface always loses the battle - it's never even a contest. But alas (and luckily), groove wear does not usually manifest itself equally. Use of the same stylus often results in wear on only one part of the groove wall. This is often the case in vintage 78's that have had one owner and thus resulted in being played on only one machine with the same type of stylus, as is often the case. Unless the overall wear is severe and has damaged the entire groove, the remaining wear pattern is often consistent and limited to just one area of the groove wall. Thus even on all but the most severely worn records, there usually still remains an elusive "sweet spot" left relatively unscathed. The proper stylus selection will allow the stylus to track in the remaining undamaged part of the sidewall - either above or below the dreaded wear zone - - - into the "sweet spot" if you will........ That's the trick. Land the stylus in the elusive "sweet spot" and it's like someone threw a switch ! Out of the distorted murk emerges a signal that has surprising fidelity, depth and brilliance with minimal noise....... it was hidden there all the time: you just have to find it. Truly amazing what a mil here or there will do...... Typical Vintage 78 Groove dimensions This image depicts where a new 3 mil stylus rides in a new groove Debris Field Definition: Vintage 78's may have as many as 40 to over 100 years of exposure to all kinds of contaminants. No matter how well a record is cleaned, or the high tech cleaning machine employed, close inspection with a microscope reveals always a certain small amount of dirt and debris remaining in the very bottom of the groove. Short of totally destroying the disc attempting to remove it, a small amount is there to stay. The most common type of record groove wear In the case depicted here, the tip of the stylus is plowing through the rubble of the debris field and there's not much left of the mid and lower sidewalls. The resulting audio will be mostly noise and distortion and probably not much more - - - beyond what any restoration software or even experienced alchemist can do much with. Alas, all is not lost, there probably remains hidden the golden sweet spot. Find it and it's almost like you uncovered a new record. Life will be good ! As the groove wears, the mid and lower parts of the groove wall get worn down and the stylus rides lower in the groove closer to the debris field. Ultimately, unless a larger stylus is employed, the stylus will eventually wear its' way down into the debris field with vastly increased surface noise and greatly reduced signal to noise ratios. As disastrous as this is, under certain scenarios, the upper part of the groove wall usually remains pretty much unscathed. The wear zone widens both as a result of the stylus wearing down the groove wall and sinking deeper, plus the stylus itself becoming worn with it's sides flattened at the highest stress points of contact - widening and deepening the wear zone even further. Selecting a larger truncated stylus will raise it off the "rocky" floor and allow it to track in the middle of the golden sweet spot. If in the disc's prior history a larger stylus was used before it "bottomed out", there are often 2 sweet spots.... One on the upper wall, and the other towards the bottom. This scenario is a little more rare. Luckily, most vintage 78's that have been in storage for years have always been played with the same size stylus. Grandma and Gramps were most likely not purist audiophiles and thus used only one steel needle ! Though it was recommended by most manufacturers that a new needle was to be used for each record played, the simple reality is that few folks ever did... If it managed to play at all, then good enough ! ...... As a result, the entire bottom or floor of the the groove wall is simply worn out but the upper walls are sometimes almost completely untouched ! A quick check with a microscope will quickly reveal the type and location of wear and will quickly show if a sweet spot exists. (more than likely, it usually does ! ). Now it's a simple matter of measuring the groove width at the sweet spot level and selecting a truncated stylus size to fit. Sadly, some vintage records are simply worn out and no sweet spot is left. Many of the records made for home record cutters, used an acetate over fiber substrate. The surface coat had to be made soft enough to allow cutting by the recording cutter head. The soft top coat on these discs would not tolerate repeated playings without the grooves prematurely wearing down. ---------------- Very nice post. A good case for the line contact stylus, as it relates to LPs "worn out" with conicals. Line contact design is one reason why the Shure V15 sounds so good on LPs that sound like crap with other profiles.

---------------- On 5/14/2005 10:24:11 AM Piranha wrote: Edgewound, This is fascinating stuff. Are you coming to Indy? It would be nice if you would provide all of us novices a demo of your top of the line audiophile TT the Friday mixer. I for one am looking forward to that possibilty. Now I am in a quandary. Do I buy a Rega or VPI? That is the million dollar question. I am SOOOOOOOO confused. 25-30 years ago this vinyl stuff was so easy for me. My how times have changed. ---------------- Wise guy!

---------------- On 5/13/2005 3:18:22 PM flegz wrote: Thanks.. Grado gold is a MM or MC? Will it work in the Phono stage of the PAS2? ---------------- All Grado's are moving magnet types. It's interesting because Joe Grado invented the moving coil.

Sorry if you've already said, but who's doing your pressings? RTI? Can I buy a copy? I'd love to hear your stuff.

---------------- On 5/13/2005 12:00:06 PM jazman wrote: ---------------- On 5/13/2005 9:35:55 AM Edgewound wrote: On 5/12/2005 5:48:53 PM Edgewound wrote: If I had to choose, I'd forgo the VTA before the bias. With the VPI your cartridge/tracking force options will be more limited, UNLESS you don't mind wearing out one side of the groove at a more accelerated rate than the other, not to mention the uneven stylus wear you're guaranteed with this type of arm. Just curious, how many times would you need to play an LP in this circumstance for this kind of wear to be significant? C&S ---------------- Once, and every time after that. ---------------- So with every repeated playing should you be able to hear a degradation in the sonic quality of the LP? Also, how many times can it be played like that before it is ready for the trash bin? c7 ---------------- Wear occurs with every play, with ANY arm/cartridge set-up, as I'm sure you already know. I would think the goal should be to keep it at a minimum. Erroneous bias settings may not even be audible, at first, depending on the degree of error, and the damage it causes is cumulative, and once again, dependent upon the degree of error. It's possible that you may NEVER even notice it until you spin a fresh pressing of the same title, who knows. But the damage is real and a fact, so why bother with any arm possessing dubious tracking abilities, and no real provision to compensate for this fact of physics. It's not as if analog playback doesn't already have enough challenges as it is. Without proper bias adjust, everthing is affected, most notably resonance frequencies and cartridge/cantilever behavior at those frequencies. NO SET-UP IS PERFECT, but the Rega arm allows the user to come a hell of a lot closer than most. The VTA issue can be resolved for $50 bucks. In my opinion, the only meaningful VTA solution is VTA "on the fly", as every disc is different, thickness wise. I don't worry about VTA every time I put a disc on the platter, especially when drinking or partying http://forums.klipsch.com/idealbb/images/smilies/2.gif"> It's the same thing as a car with a bad alignment that "pulls" to the left or the right, ANY car no matter how well made, expensive or beautiful. How long will the tires hold up until the cord starts to show? Just keep driving it that way and then you'll find out. ---------------- Before you try to sell the world the RB300 and anti-skating is the answer to "come a hell of lot closer to perfect", I would suggest you not use automobile tires as part of your argument. The two issues and engineering problems are not even close! Anti skating is an engineering problem with a load of different ways of combating it. They cause other compromises that then have to be fixed. Then the fixes cause more compromises elsewhere, and these have to be fixed, and so on. Several manufacturers over the years have suggested skating is something that is going to happen no matter what you try to do to stop it. Since anti skating is effective only at some points on the disc, the argument is trying to apply anything is likely to cause as much bad as it will provide good. You also seem to lack a firm understanding of unipivot designs. You seem more directed at championing the RB300 than having a true understanding of the issues involved in tonearm design and anti skating in particular. Klipsch out. ---------------- I don't need to sell the world on the Rega arms, the world's already buying them, they've sold themselves. Want to venture a guess on how many table makers use Rega, or a modified form? The tire analogy IS a good one. As you and I have both pointed out, NO ARM IS PERFECT, mathematically or geometrically speaking, just as the suspension on any automobile does not offer PERFECT tire to road interface under all driving conditions. Compromises must be made, due to the physical dynamics involved. The Rega arms simply allow for more adjustment combinations to be made, to help lesson the effects of these problems (engineering, as you pointed out), inherent with LP playback. I'm happy you like Harry's arms. When's the new "upgrade" due?

---------------- On 5/13/2005 10:49:34 AM Cal Blacksmith wrote: When we talk about records wearing out and high dollar turntables, I just need to grin a little bit. My grandfather worked for a Jukebox manufacturing company (I dont remember which one) and they did some lifetime cycle tests on their turntables and mechanisms. They set the tone arm to drop on the last few groves on a record and let the mechanism cycle 1000 times to see where the wear was going to be on the unit. After the test was run, they realized that the last groves were PLAYED the same 1000 times and took a look at the groves under a microscope to see how much they had changed. Well they could find NO appreciable excessive wear! This was with a JUKE BOX heavy tracking tone arm and stylus, so when we talk about micro weight cartridges causing damage on the first play and every play there after, I just gotta grin! Yes in theory it is possible but how much of that is in the mind? You've got to be kidding, I hope. Next time you get a chance at a flea market or used record store, pick up a disc that has spent it's life in a juke box! "Well they could find NO appreciable excessive wear!" What does that mean? Appreciable to the eye? Many frequencies, when represented on a phongraph record ARE microscopic. I doubt a juke box maker is concerned with bandwidth, just how often the vendor will have to rotate out worn out discs. To compare a commercial juke box to a high resolution, transcription table is absurd. Have you ever considered the temperatures realized at the stylus' point of contact with the grooves of a record?, even at today's low VTFs? Your anecdote is laughable.

On 5/12/2005 5:48:53 PM Edgewound wrote: If I had to choose, I'd forgo the VTA before the bias. With the VPI your cartridge/tracking force options will be more limited, UNLESS you don't mind wearing out one side of the groove at a more accelerated rate than the other, not to mention the uneven stylus wear you're guaranteed with this type of arm. Just curious, how many times would you need to play an LP in this circumstance for this kind of wear to be significant? C&S ---------------- Once, and every time after that. ---------------- So with every repeated playing should you be able to hear a degradation in the sonic quality of the LP? Also, how many times can it be played like that before it is ready for the trash bin? c7 ---------------- Wear occurs with every play, with ANY arm/cartridge set-up, as I'm sure you already know. I would think the goal should be to keep it at a minimum. Erroneous bias settings may not even be audible, at first, depending on the degree of error, and the damage it causes is cumulative, and once again, dependent upon the degree of error. It's possible that you may NEVER even notice it until you spin a fresh pressing of the same title, who knows. But the damage is real and a fact, so why bother with any arm possessing dubious tracking abilities, and no real provision to compensate for this fact of physics. It's not as if analog playback doesn't already have enough challenges as it is. Without proper bias adjust, everthing is affected, most notably resonance frequencies and cartridge/cantilever behavior at those frequencies. NO SET-UP IS PERFECT, but the Rega arm allows the user to come a hell of a lot closer than most. The VTA issue can be resolved for $50 bucks. In my opinion, the only meaningful VTA solution is VTA "on the fly", as every disc is different, thickness wise. I don't worry about VTA every time I put a disc on the platter, especially when drinking or partying It's the same thing as a car with a bad alignment that "pulls" to the left or the right, ANY car no matter how well made, expensive or beautiful. How long will the tires hold up until the cord starts to show? Just keep driving it that way and then you'll find out.