There is nothing that irritates me more than guys in the "Analog" forum. When these "newbies" buy a record player and wonder why their records don’t sound so hot, those guys act like they don’t know what’s wrong, when they know full well that if you don’t have a big buck high end rig, CD’s sound better.
Back in the early 90’s I had just put in a good 3 years auditioning and putting together my dream system in my newly remodeled listening room. Had a nice CD player and thought I was done when reading Robert Harley’s Compete Guide to High End Audio and got to the chapter on turntables, wherein he says this is the foundation of a high end system. Still.
Really? How? No way.
But out in my garage was my old Technics SL-1700 just sitting in a box. Still had my 1970’s vintage Kenwood integrated with its built-in phono stage. So I dug it out and hooked it all up. It was around this time that I noticed the cantilever on the Stanton 681EEE cartridge was bent. Dang. Oh well, pliers. Kinked but straightened I put on one of my records.
Out from my speakers came this rich full sound so much better than anything I had heard from any CD anywhere in my searches. You coulda knocked me over with a feather.
Wife comes home that night, hears music, gets all interested asks what is that? Tom Petty. No, I mean what is it? What do you mean? It sounds so good. She was right. It did sound good. She had no idea. Could not see it was a record. The turntable was down on the floor, out of sight, so of course it had to be CD. That was after all all we had. When she came in and had a look she was as amazed as me.
Okay so let’s review:
1970’s DD turntable.
Bent cantilever.
Patch cords.
1970’s phono stage.
Grand total $700 new, or about $0 at then used prices. Before the Technics started appreciating. Beat CD, according to double- no, wait! triple blind testing.
Anyone says you need to spend a lot to sound good, either no idea what they’re talking about, or they’re talking ideology not sound. Or both.
