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Better Records White Hot Stampers: Now the Story Can Be Told!

Just got shipping notification, so now the story can be told!

  Better-Records.com is a small, incredibly valuable yet little known company run out of Thousand Oaks, CA by Tom Port. The business started out many years ago when Tom Port noticed no two records sound quite the same. Evidently Tom is a sound quality fanatic on a scale maybe even higher than mine, and he started getting together with some of his audio buds doing shoot-outs in a friendly competition to see who has the best sounding copy.   

Over time this evolved into Better-Records.com, where the best of the best of these shoot-outs can be bought by regular guys like me who live for the sound, but just don't have the time or the drive to go through all the work of finding these rare gems.

The difference in quality between your average pressing and a White Hot Stamper is truly incredible. If you don't have the system or the ears of course you may never notice. If you do though then nothing else comes even close.   

Tom will say things like only one in twenty copies is Hot Stamper worthy. This doesn't even come close to conveying the magnitude. Last night for example, wife and I were listening to our White Hot Stamper of Tchaikovsky 1812. Then we played another White Hot Tchaikovsky. Then we played the Tchaikovsky tracks from my copy of Clair deLune.  

Without hearing a White Hot you would think Clair de Lune is about as good as it gets. After two sides of Tom's wonders it was flat, dull, mid-fi. Not even in the same ball park. And yet this is quite honestly a very good record. How many of these he has to clean, play, and compare to find the rare few magical sounding copies, I don't even know!  

Copies of Hot Stamper quality being so hard to find means of course they are not always available. This is not like going to the record store. There are not 50 copies of Year of the Cat just sitting around. Most of the time there are no copies at all. When there are, they get snapped up fast. Especially the popular titles. Fleetwood Mac Rumours, Tom Petty Southern Accents, whole bunch of em like this get sold pretty fast even in spite of the astronomically outrageous prices they command. Then again, since people pay - and fast - maybe not so outrageous after all.   

So I spent months looking, hoping for Year of the Cat to show up. When it did, YES! Click on it and.... Sorry, this copy is SOLD! What the...? It was only up a day! If that!  

Well now this puts me in a bit of a spot. Because, see, besides loving music and being obsessed with sound quality, I'm also enthusiastic about sharing this with others. With most things, no problem. Eric makes an endless supply of Tekton Moabs. Talking up Tekton or Townshend or whatever has no effect on my ability to get mine. With Better-records.com however the supply is so limited the last thing I need is more competition. Bit of a bind.   

Even so, can't keep my big mouth shut. Been telling everyone how great these are. One day someone buys one based on my recommendation, Tom finds out, next thing you know I'm a Good Customer. What does that mean? Well is there anything you're looking for? Year of the Cat. That's a hard one. Tell me about it. Might take a while. Take all the time you need. Just get me one. Please. Okay.  

That was months ago. Other day, hey we're doing a shoot-out. No guarantees but should be able to find you one. So for the last few days I was all Are we there yet? Are we there yet? And now finally, like I said, shipped!  

So now I have my Grail, and the story can be told. Got a nice little collection of Hot Stampers, and will be adding more, but this for me is The One. Might not be for you, but that is the beauty of it all. Many of us have that one special record we love. If you do too, and you want to hear it like listening to the master tape, this is the way to go.
128x128millercarbon
skypunk's avatar
skypunk
499 posts
 
@gulpson. Enjoy the music.

Enjoy the science: PVC vs Polycarbonate. PVC everyday!

https://cen.acs.org/articles/94/i24/Groovy-chemistry-materials-science-behind.html

http://www.madehow.com/Volume-1/Compact-Disc.html

only the facts mam. 

tablejockey
3,772 posts
 
"Another one, Sinatra-Basie, is also on the way."

Great album. The 2nd collaboration is another to look out for-"It might as well be swing"  Lots of good ol male chauvinist references in that period of popular music.

I have both the stereo/mono press of these albums. The mono press is the one to own. Excellent "Sinatra is in the room" sonics, even without a proper mono cart.

Looked at the Sinatra offerings......Yikes! Goodwill White Hots @$300!
I will lay out that kind of dough for a real deal R&R stamper, but not my parents music!
glupson
7,842 posts
 
skypunk,

Thanks for the links, I am glad I inspired you to learn something. Now dig deeper into chemistry and the secret behind "carbon discs" will reveal itself to you.
tomcy6's avatar
tomcy6
2,534 posts
 
According to the RIAA, LP sales made up about 4% of music revenues for the first half of 2020. The remaining 96% is digital including CDs, SACDs, downloads and streaming. Mostly streaming.

It is true that LP sold more in dollar amount in the first half of 2020 than CD, but in units sold CD still outsold LP 10.2 million units to 8.8 million units. LP unit sales will probably surpass CD soon though.

Mid-Year-2020-RIAA-Revenue-Statistics.pdf

They haven’t released full year 2020 figures probably due to some aspect of the Covid disaster.
millercarbon's avatar
millercarbon OP
12,531 posts
 
First impression, gotta say, the cover is mint. Like time machine mint. That thin shrink wrap plastic records used to come in? Really meticulous types would carefully cut along the opening with a razor blade so as to preserve that plastic? Even though, unless you were very careful, it would get torn just in the normal back and forth of playing? Well whoever had this was so careful it is still perfectly cut just along the opening.

Not the only one like this either. Rumours was like this, except that one the plastic had been torn just a little. Not all are like this. Most are just really impressively crisp and mint. This kind of gets pushed to the side in all the talk about sound quality. They also come complete with the original inner sleeve.  

Tom packages these in a way that really helps preserve this crisp mint condition. The cover, record, and inner sleeve all come packaged in a large clear plastic sleeve. Your impeccably cleaned record is of course in a new high grade audiophile sleeve. This packaging makes it easy to remove and replace the record without touching the album cover. Sweet!  

Back to sound quality. I'm writing this while eating dinner, warming up, and demagnetizing the system. The XLO demagnetizing tracks are on a CD burned just for this, the tracks repeating half a dozen times. Pretty much all CD is good for anyway, but it is good for that, might as well admit it, and use it.

Give it another 15 min and we will be ready for some warm-up sides. Wouldn't dream of putting a White Hot on a system that isn't ready for it. Couple three sides oughta do it. Then Zero-stat, run the Radio Shack Bulk Tape Eraser over all the cables, and the record, spray Static Guard, turn the damn CDP off, dim the lights, and get ready for the needle drop.

Someone was asking, when it comes to buying these things, what I recommend. Well here it is, short and not so sweet: If you think this kind of prep is over the top, or worse if you think it's nuts, or worst of all if you tried and can't hear any difference, then my recommendation is stick with your record store records. But if you are already doing these, or if you try a couple and appreciate the improvement, then my recommendation is, these are the records you are looking for. Go for it.
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