New Vinyl Setup

Assuming you don't buy some POS, which you can avoid with some meager homework, there is really no advantage to buying new vs. new.

Now, just for food for thought, there are advantages for buying a little higher up the food chain than the normal suggestions for starter tables. (No, I'm not in the audio business.) Obviously, if you go here you should be committed to this undertaking prior to making such a purchase. The advantage is that you'll have equipment with much better adjustment capabilities to allow you to learn and you'll skip that effort of buying and selling as you move up.

That is, if you know you're already afflicted.

;)

Now you've gone and put me on the spot, Tvad. :) But I'm game for taking a few risks here.

My experiences with the starter tables was a mixed bag. They are certainly good enough to have shown me what vinyl can be. But in my case I'm a hands-on type and willing to put time into tweaking things. Arms, tables, cartridge, equipment stands, etc. After about a year or so I realized that many of the parameter adjustments I wanted to learn about were just not supported well enough to help me learn these things properly. This is part of the point I was trying to make the other day in that thread about the test LPs.

I realize that not everyone is going to keep moving up and investing more and more in vinyl playback like I've done. However, it sure seems that more people do end up moving up than remain completely satisfied with that starter table (these are the lucky few). I have always gone over the top in my hobbies whether it was race cars or woodworking, so I always new what was going to happen for me.

One combo I have experience with that I can offer is a Basis 1400 with either the Rega or (even better) a Vector tonearm. These can be had for around $1K, maybe a bit more if it includes a Vector. The one adjustment that is not as micro-adjustable with this combination is VTA. However, the business card shim trick works well and there is only one set screw. This makes it pretty easy to do. The Basis motors are rock solid.

I think the Graham 2.2 is another great tonearm value. It has all of the micro adjustment capability and has been mated with many different tables over the years. Such a combination would run closer to $3K, I would expect. While it may be a bit fussy to extract the maximum performance, the 2.2 is an excellent tool for learning.

I know that's only two but these are the ones I'm most familiar with. Hopefully, some else will chime in with some more suggestions. I'd bet Doug, Raul, Thom Mackris, to name a few, would have some great suggestions along these lines.

I should have probably added that buying used is the better value most of the time, but perhaps that is obvious.

I'm sure there are other tables in the same range as the 1400 that are very good. I offer it because that is one, along with a Basis 2100 and 2500, that I've spent some time with. The 2100 used a Vector arm and latter I used that same Vector and a Graham 2.2 on the 2500. I had purchased the 1400 used here in the ads to use until my Gavia was delivered, say about 10 months altogether. (Not that the Gavia took that long, but I sold the 2500 to help the funding issue.) Even though I knew the quality and performance of Basis products I was very pleasantly surprised with the 1400. That table had a modified RB300. The 1400's usually go for $800-$1000 used. If you compare that to the cost of say a new MMF-7 (not picking on Music Hall here, but I owned one of those as well for a while) then there is so much more offered from the Basis. Better bearing, motor, etc. I suspect that VPI, SME, etc would also have models that would do well.

Doug makes a great point. The only real sin is to buy high-end and never take the time to learn how to improve the setup.

Doug, I must give credit to TWL as well. He once gave out this advice about buying higher up the first time. Unfortunately for me it was well into my 'table journey. But looking back I can really appreciate now what he was saying.