What does clipping sound like?

I can't believe the level of stupidity in some of these posts. Well... actually...yes I can. 

The "clipping"...or distortion... can be narrowed down by the process of elimination. It's not happening with Netflix...therefore it's not an amp problem. It seems to happen only with vinyl records on the turntable. the most likely culprit is a worn out stylus. I had the same issue with a Philips turntable many years ago. Phono stylus does, in fact, wear out...and cause distortion on record playback.

I have less than 200 hours on my Miyajima Shalabi. Triplanar arm, Woodsong Garrard 301.
I am actually hoping that it is a compliance mismatch cart and arm.
Just playing 1812 Overture on the cannons the arm jumped off the record and the sound stopped for an instant!
Sure seems like the cart is not tracking.
At least I now have a torture test!

That’s one of the limitations of vinyl records...lol... A digital recording might have sent your woofers’ cones flying across the room.

I bought a JBL C37 cabinet loaded with a 175DLH and 130A from a gentleman that actually built it in 1957 when he worked there. He advertised the system for sale on Craigslist. Prospective buyer showed up to test it with his McIntosh and turntable with The 1812 Overture with Cannons. Cannons went off...something didn’t sound right...Guy packed up his amp and turntable and split...because he split the cone on the 130A. "yeah...well...ok...thanks..." and he left.

on some amps the clipping seems benign, just a squashing of dynamics. i've heard some tube amps that did that. on most transistorized amps i've heard, it is harsh hash, or loud crackling.

If it's the old classic power amp type clipping, a tube amp will go into clipping before you know it's there perhaps, since tubes soft-clip. They're not 'fast enough' to saw off a waveform like it had been cut with scissors. The edges round off. It may not be offensive enough to notice until you really overdrive it.

This explanation is incorrect. Tube amps can be just as fast as solid state- the risetime in the output section of our OTLs is about 600V/uS- there are very few solid state amps that fast. The correct explanation is tube amps make less odd ordered harmonics as they clip; this results in smoother sound as the amps overload.

That’s one of the limitations of vinyl records...lol... A digital recording might have sent your woofers’ cones flying across the room.

This is nonsense. If the LP is properly mastered it may well be uncompressed while quite often the digital release is (since there is no expectation that the LP will be played in a car).


The reason the stylus jumped out of the groove is that its mismatched with the tonearm. If you want to talk about limitations in LP playback, this is one of them- you can set up an excellent cartridge with an excellent tonearm and it won't play properly if they are mismatched. The compliance of the cartridge in tandem with the mass of the cartridge in the arm must produce a mechanical resonance between 7-12Hz. If not in that window you can get mistracking and actually have the stylus jump out of the groove.