@lewm I’ve been doing marathon listening sessions to get through all of the LPs I ordered and I honestly can’t recall if I listened to the entirety of Relaxin' before deciding that it needed to be exchanged. I’ll listen to the whole thing today and see if I hear any distortion. Do you recall which track was affected and what you heard?
QC at QRP
Let me start this post by saying that I'm a long-time supporter of Acoustic Sounds/Analog Productions, and think Chad Kassem has done the analog community a huge service by reissuing so many great recordings of the past on high quality vinyl and with beautiful packaging. That said...
I recently placed a fairly substantial order from AS that included several jazz and classical reissues pressed by QRP. As the reviews all say, the packaging is beautiful and the recordings from that batch that I've listened to so far have sounded very good. However, I am a bit disappointed in the quality of some of the QRP pressings. At least half of the records in this batch are noticeably warped. I'm not expecting the utmost perfection in terms of record flatness, but some of these are warped to the point where the clamp on my Michell turntable isn't able to get them reasonably flat - and the Michell clamp is the most effective one I've ever used at tightly coupling an LP to the platter. Without the clamp the records are unacceptably wavy.
I keep asking myself if I'm being unreasonable in my expectations and maybe I am. But these are 'premium' $40+ records from a company with their own pressing plant and that touts the quality of their pressings at every turn - 'Quality' is in their name, after all! A couple of the records also have spindle holes that are drilled so small that the records can't be placed on the spindle without excessive force. And, once on, removing the record from the spindle is another adventure. Not acceptable IMHO.
I'm tempted to return close to half the records in this order, but I'll probably limit it to the most egregious cases. If the Michell clamp can reasonably flatten a record then I wont return it.
Are others experiencing similar QC problems with QRP pressings? YouTube channels like Scott Wilson's The Pressing Matters and others seem to universally praise the Analog Productions/QRP LPs - I don't think I've ever heard Scott complain about warped LPs from QRP or discuss other pressing anomalies like poorly drilled spindle holes.
Maybe I've just been unlucky, but I'd love to hear the experience of others.
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I buy a lot of records from Acoustic Sounds, and plenty are QRP pressings. I rarely receive a warped record and when I do they are easy to do business with. The internet generated RMA is typically responded to within 1 day and if it's a QRP record they always send a new copy without the jacket, if it is a non-QRP product, they request the return with their accompanying return shipping label. An easy process, so long as you remain in the 30-day window. I once went past 30 days (about 40 days or so) and they were very lenient about it. That said, my return rate is about 5%. Their tight spindle holes are 100% consistent on all QRP pressings. At least, that is the case for me on my turntable. I use a Clear Audio spindle hole reamer. It takes just a few seconds, and the record is a perfect fit. I believe that the tolerances in spindle production vary enough that the presses QRP uses just don't work well with those spindles on the higher side of tolerance. I could be wrong, but that is my guestimate. I find that all of the QRP records have excellent sound quality. However, my real complaint is that far too many have surface noise that is well beyond what the maximum should be. I tend to think they are skimping on vinyl quality. A high-quality vinyl formula goes a million miles in quiet surfaces. The pressings I get from RTI are consistently quiet. I have never received a noisy record from Impex but I often do from QRP. Vinyl formula is my only conclusion because mastering, plating, and pressing at QRP are all excellent. If anyone has more to offer on that subject I look forward to hearing about it. I believe you will find that Acoustic Sounds will work with you in the most honorable fashion. |
@mammothguy54 Thanks for chiming in. BTW, you're not the first person in this thread to mention high levels of surface noise with some QRP pressings. That's not something I've experienced to date. Unless I'm less sensitive to that, but I'm pretty picky so I doubt it |
@lpluvr The list of noisy albums from QRP is somewhat extensive, but off the top of my head here are a couple. From the Pablo Series, Sarah Vaughan, How long has this been going on? Also, Gerry Mulligan, Night Lights. I would need to dig through my collection to find the others. Probably about 15% of all the QRP records that I order, though. And then again, so many others are just superb. Is it bad luck or is it the vinyl formula? Maybe something other? It's definitely not my system or my cartridge setup. I have been setting up tonearms and phono cartridges for many years and more recently updated my setup tools with an entire suite of WAM Engineering, Wally Tools. It's the vinyl formula, bad luck, or some other QC issue at QRP. When I request a replacement due to a high level of surface noise the replacement copy has the exact same issue. I welcome advice or comments from anyone who wishes to add information and/or thoughts on this.
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Lpluvr, the incident with Relaxing on Classic was too long ago to remember in detail except to say that it had to be a defect in manufacture because the distortion was so profound as not to be recognizable as music. It affected one cut on one side as I recall. I still have the 5 LP set so I suppose I could try to find the defect, but I lack the necessary zeal right now. |
Do you have some examples of the noisy LPs you've received?- 51 posts total