Vinyl Newbie - So Many Questions!
New to these forums and new to vinyl, but longtime audiophile, so I feel comfortable saying that I know what I’m hearing but can’t figure out why.
It would probably help if I summarize my system to aid in troubleshooting:
Marantz TT 15S1
iFi Zen phono preamp
Naim Uniti Atom as streamer/preamp/dac
Conrad Johnson CAV-45 S2
Klipsch Cornwall IV
I’ll start with the easy one
1. I followed the setup instructions for the Marantz tt meticulously. Every time I start the motor, the belt squeaks and slips on the motor pulley before getting up to speed. It’s annoying and really cheapens the experience. Is this normal?
2. The sound quality ranges from very bad to very good, largely dependent on the record. I don’t have a large collection as I just started with vinyl, but many of these pressings sound absolutely terrible. Many sound distorted and compressed. Many have tons of clicks and pops. I double checked the settings on my phono preamp which is really just moving magnet. There aren’t a lot of settings. One for MM and three for MC. I connected the phono preamp directly to the Conrad Johnson instead of the analog input on the Naim and while it does sound “better”, it’s mostly the same.
I don’t have another cartridge or phono preamp to swap out and try to isolate the issue. Could it simply be that the phono preamp is defective? It seems that if the cartridge was defective it would just all sound bad. Could it be that my system is revealing enough that it’s showing the limitation of the iFI? I just think it would sound “good” all the time, but never really “great”. Could it be that all of these pressings are so incredibly crappy that I’m hearing just how bad they are?
The couple of “mainstream” records do sound pretty good. Namely Gregory Porter, Adele, Gary Clark Jr, Miles Davis, John Coltrane. But even a couple of those have inconsistently cut holes for the spindle (some of them bind), significant warps, and some off-center labels. The independent stuff is all over the map. A couple of the John Prine pressings sound very good, but have soooo many clicks and pops it’s ridiculous - even after cleaning. And one of them wouldn’t even go on the spindle because the hole was so small.
Anyway, I’m just perplexed and pretty annoyed. I’ve debated buying another turntable (with cartridge) and phono preamp just to see if there’s any change. Any suggestions? Is that my best course of action - to just buy another preamp and cartridge to troubleshoot?
I wish there was a simple way to post pictures. The motor literally sits on the shelf, completely independent from the plinth. Since there is already tension on the belt between the motor and the platter, it’s very easy to move the motor and end up with it in contact with the plinth. The only thing holding it in place is a bit of friction from the little feet under the motor and inertia. I listen to a lot of “independent” type artists who tend to be on small and sometimes even their own record labels. Unfortunately, the production quality is just very poor. Im going to have to rethink my vinyl purchases and stick with stuff that I really want to own that’s either on a larger label or just purchase audiophile pressings. It’s more than a little disappointing that new vinyl seems to be such trash. In a timely YouTube video posted just yesterday, Paul McGowan talked about that very subject and seems to support what I’m hearing; namely that much of the new vinyl coming out is just a highly compressed digital transfer to vinyl. Much worse than just listening to a CD or highres stream. |
BlueTac under the motor feet to stop it moving? Phono amp: DECWARE Zen Triode Vacuum Tube Phono Stage ~ model ZP3 SpinClean - 80% of the expensive units for little money. invaluable. |
Let’s forget about the quality or lack there of of new vinyl issues for the moment. You actually have a system there that ought to be capable of very nice better than mediocre phono reproduction. So it is worthwhile to analyze that system first before casting aspersions on the LPs themselves. Are you saying that the RCA’s between your IFI phono and the CJ amplifier are something called “monolith”?The capacitance of those cables does not matter much in this instance. The only thing that is important is the capacitance of the cables between tonearm and the phono inputs on your phono stage. The responder who said you’re ok for total capacitance is wrong because we don’t yet know the capacitance added by the ICs between cartridge and phono stage. I’d bet they add at least another 100pF, so your cartridge is likely seeing >200pF when it’s designed for 100pF. It is going to be a bit difficult to rectify this problem, if it is the reason why you are hearing ticks and pops so often. What happens is that the relatively high inductance of a moving magnet cartridge in combination with the load resistance and with the total capacitance results in a high frequency resonance. With MM cartridges you have to be careful to keep that high frequency resonance well above audibility. When you have too much capacitance, that high frequency resonance will move down in frequency into the audible range. This can result in exaggerated perception of ticks and pops. |
I have been there and done that many yrs ago. I came to understand that I had a weak link in the chain. A system is only as good as its weakest link. in your case, it is the IFI. You system is crying out for their equal so they don't get blamed. Your TT casts $2k, your Cartridge costs $1k and your phono preamp costs $200 or $0.2. See the imbalance? indeed price is NOT a complete indicator of quality. BUT its a good place to start and it is an indicator. The phono preamp is as important as the TT itself or any other component in the chain. It handles the most fragile of signals. Get a good Phono preamp that costs as least as much as the cartridge. |
