Stylus-Drag..Fact or Fiction?

jtimothya, I am going to do that tomorrow! I will take an Air Force 1 with a 4 point 11 and an SME 30/12 with a 4 point 11 both with PC-1 Supreme's 
and make that comparison. I already have the 30/12. mikelavigne will lend me the other $150,000 and you can come tell us which one you like better. Graham Engineering is right down the road.
You might notice that the rags do this type of comparison all the time. The problem for all these audio aficionados is that if I do this study correctly, double blinded nobody would be able to reliably tell the difference between the two except for jtimothya of course. The major attraction to turntables is mechanical. They are cool devices and we all have our perspective on what cool is. You take for instance a Hurican, a 488 and a 720s. Three very competent sports cars all around the same price. All are in the same performance envelope, All three have their champions who will swear their car is the best.....actually it is the best looking to them because that is where the real difference lies. Me, I'll take the 720s any day. mikelavigne is a financial wizard so he would take the 488 for it's resale value. jtimothya wants to be as cool as possible so he would take the Hurican. That is what turntables are. 
Mikelavigne, that is what all of us long term audiophiles do. We evolve our systems over time always attempting to improve performance. You are just able to do it at a higher price point. Very few of us are going to be able to jump for DZ NHB-458's  or have you gone to the 468's? Now personally I would never even listen to an amp like that. I think it is the silliest looking amplifier ever made. I would go for the Atma-Sphere MA-3.
All go and no show until you take a look inside, all beautifully hand wired point to point. You can see where the money went. Oh, and I do not have to put my amps on seismic platforms, they are under the speakers in the room below on a shelf near the ceiling attached to a concrete wall. The speaker cables are 32" long. Each amp has it's own 20 amp service:)

Mike 

ok, since we are in a free fall anyway here we go......

back in the day (in spring 2001) i had borrowed Atma-Sphere MA2 Mk (something or other, i’m sure Ralph will jump in to clarify). had them in my system for a couple of weeks, and was about to order a pair. very impressed other than my wife thought they were ugly. then the friend who loaned me the MA2’s called me to tell me about some other tube amps he had, the 75 watt Tenor OTL’s. i went to listen to those and preferred them to the MA2’s. the Tenor was just better to my ears. more fleshed out and natural sounding....with a magical mid range transparency and sparkle, even though it had quite a bit less power. so i went with the Tenors.

three years later, after a number of Tenor OTL explosive events, i had the opportunity to try this new solid state stereo amp, the darTZeel 108. here was a solid state amp that did not sound solid state, it had that breath of life of tubes, but the low noise floor of solid state. i loved it.

i still love it. i’ve had some pretty awesome tube amps in my system to run against the big darts. the big darts are still here. (if i ever stop buying turntables, arms and cartridges i will upgrade my 7 year old 458’s to the new 468.....but not yet).

my reference sound now 18 years later is still that Tenor OTL. and the darts deliver it....and much more.

and you have every right to your opinion on the look of the darTZeels. opinions are free.

a note about Atma-Sphere; no one takes better care of customers than Atma-Sphere, and i love the sound of their amps. and Ralph is a great guy and very helpful on the forums. i just don’t happen to own them. i’ve highly recommended them to many over the years.

basically i’m a tube guy who owns solid state.

much respect for your amp install approach, but a useful discussion of the details of active isolation is too deep for a brief comment. it's a big subject. maybe another day?

@mikelavigne , "basically i’m a tube guy who owns solid state."

That's also true of most of us here, isn't it?

I just wish someone would put out a solid state amp in tube disguise. They say looks aren't everything, but they're certainly something.

That’s also true of most of us here, isn’t it?

i suppose it depends on your definition of ’here’.

on an analog oriented thread like this one, i’d say most have, or prefer, tubes or a tube like presentation. otherwise in general maybe a bit different. just my 2 cents.

i do think that darTZeel solid state does get as close to the positive attributes of tubes as any solid state. and avoids the worst of solid state similarly. even though it's got that red and gold 'ironman' look.

mikelavigne, you ever listen to JC-1's in your system? Maybe just a slightly better value many of us can afford.