Considering vinyl end game... but you're putting me off!

Hi-Fi Corner
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I kept my vinyl and when I bought the 222 /300 upgraded my Linn LP12 to about Selekt level for about a third of the cost of a new one. I have been buying some vinyl again from just before the lockdowns and so far have been lucky and not needed to return any for pressing defects. Playing vinyl a lot more now.

However, if I didn’t have TT and a collection of LPs still I think it is unlikely that I would have bought one. HH is right about a record cleaning machine and having heard a before and after a Degritter on a record that had already been cleaned by another well-liked record cleaner I think that is the one to go for, but at around £2k, is painfully expensive. I tend not to buy much in the second-hand market, uhttps://community.naimaudio.com/t/considering-vinyl-end-game-but-youre-putting-me-off/28358/19nless I know and trust the shop/seller. I also tend not to buy remastered classic albums, preferring to buy recently released music which in my experience doesn’t seem to have the problems that the releases do. With the recent price rises of raw vinyl stock and other price pressures with the manufacture of records, they are becoming a very expensive way to get your music fix.

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I had vinyl many years ago.

Today the turntable has been replaced by a NAS and a streamer. Quite happy with the quality of streaming music and do not miss the storage, retrieval and cost of vinyl.

The cost alone of albums today is enough to keep me away.

I am happy enough to read about others pursing the vinyl route, often while streaming music.

Life is sweet and so is the music…

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23

Over my years with NAIM, I have heard a lot of top end digital sources from Linn, NAIM, VITUS and they are all very good, but and there is a BUT none of the top end sources can match the musical reproduction of my LP12 – and yes it now is pretty much top of the shop thanks to @Cymbiosis

first is to get to a good dealer for a demo and have a budget in mind and then work and plan from there - after all it is a choice - I prefer what vinyl offers

Some of the albums I have owned for 40 years still play and deliver the music, and just having spent £160 on Roger Waters Amused to death which is sonically out of this world!

All I can offer is my story and let you ears and budget decide…and enjoy the journey

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I have a fair collection of vinyl but I downgraded from a good spec LP12 to Rega Planar 3 as I hardly ever play LPs in preference to streaming. It’s only sentiment that stops me flogging my vinyl. There’s no way I’d bother if I was starting from scratch.
I really like streaming and it sounds different from vinyl but at least as good to my ears.

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25

You may be able to borrow a record cleaning machine from a mate, and some hi-fi shops will clean LPs for a small fee.

I wouldn’t give up my LP12. I am less sure that the playing process is irresistibly addictive, but there may be a bit of that, and the warm glow from nostalgia.

A bigger issue that I have no CDs that sound dramatically better (played directly or ripped and streamed) than the Qobuz or Tidal versions, and precious few that are not available on one or both.

By contrast, I have quite a few LPs where I just don’t enjoy the digital version as much as my vinyl, and quite a few that just don’t appear on streaming services. Some are odd or ancient jazz, but slightly more mainstream examples include Hot Rats, Fools’ Gold as a single, the Cowboy Junkies’ Trinity Session, Bert and John, Sticky Fingers, Gryphon, Phantasmagoria and Folkjokeopus.

If your taste leans strongly toward even vaguely modern recordings (esp. of classical) or almost anything released to much acclaim in the last 20 years, the reasons for getting a record player seem to me a lot weaker. However, the record collections that you mention may well contain just this sort of material.

I’d also agree that buying second-hand turntable from a sensible source (though perhaps with a new cartridge) would make a lot of sense, and that a sub-£1000 turntable with a £100 phono stage is unlikely to out-perform streaming on the excellent Nova for SQ. However, there are dealers selling older TTs on eBay that I’d be happy to put up against a Nova (e.g. Rega P8, non-top-spec LP12, Xerxes, various Thorens or Clearaudios at (to me) plausible prices and good phono stages (e.g. Dynavector P75, Rega Aria or Linn Linto) for less than £600.

York is not exactly isolated. Perhaps a mate with a turntable can let you hear some of these LPs in your own house through the Nova?

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26

Well… I must be strange… I do not own a Record Cleaning Machine - I simply don’t see the need for one. I have in the past had a small number of records cleaner by a dealer, on I think a Keith Monks machine, but - it didn’t do much. A noisy pressing remained just that.

The only real ‘use’ I have found for cleaning is to deal with static build up. Manual cleaning is enough for this and for me. But its rare that I do it. Usually just once, on Discogs purchases. Just … because.

YMMV, as always… :crazy_face:

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Definitely available on Qobuz by the way!

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I’m sure the DAC would be a (strong) influence, but I would have thought some of the character of the vinyl front end would show through too.

Put another way, I suspect you would be able to tell the difference if you tried two different vinyl front ends through a Nova?

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Gryphon is on Qobuz by the way. Of course what you can stream or buy tends to change.

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Dead right. I have it saved as a favourite and that is how I listen to it in Tasmania when away from Wimbledon.

However, the LP is more affecting to me than the streams, esp. Postcard Blues (and Walking After Midnight and Mining For Gold).

My reaction to Gryphon’s first album is a bit less extreme, but much the same issue applies.

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Must get round to finding a vinyl copy, I would imagine it sounds spectacular

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32

Probably not so but the Urika 2 whilst impressive on my first listen made me love my analogue phono stage even more!

Richard

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I don’t know but I do know that the Linn Selekt DSM, which I think is an excellent streamer, makes a complete hash of its analogue input. Whether that is primarily due to the fact it converts it to digital I’ve no idea but it was enough to stop me buying it.

I’ve heard both a Rega P8/Apheta3 and Linn Selekt LP12 plugged into the internal
phono stage plus the P8/Apheta3 with Aria plugged into the line level input. All options seemed to kill the sound quality to me.

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It’s a good question, and I am another that has no answer. At the margin, I found the Urika 2 a bit uninvolving (more accurate than a Linto but less foot-tap-inducing, much less pleasing than a Superline) last time I heard one, but I didn’t know then that it was converting to and from digital (or that I was hearing a 2 and not a 1).

I have no way of knowing whether that remembered effect was caused by (a) the A to D, (b) the D to A, (c) the DSP or (d) none of those, or even whether I am just wrong to find it a bit sterile (and would change my mind given enough time), but I am open to opinions.

My auditory memory really isn’t great, but from my recollections I would take the Dynavector P75 mk 4 over the Urika 2 - the latter is a more elegant and tidy solution, but costs a lot for that level of SQ.

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I have no experience with your particular piece of equipment or it’s influence on the sound one way or another, and you are of course free to enjoy your system as you wish without any judgment from the likes of me but, if you want my personal opinion as a long time vinyl enthusiast/purist, I’d say what you are proposing is the moral equivalent of buying the best single malt scotch whisky you can afford, and then using it to mix a Long Island Iced Tea because it will still taste better than a Long Island Iced Tea mixed with cheap scotch (if scotch is even an ingredient in a Long Island Iced Tea - if not, I claim metaphoric license). In any event, while the proposition is theoretically and possibly utterly true, it completely misses the point of having bought the fine single malt scotch whisky in the first place.

If you’re looking to experience the ‘magic’ that we analog devotees crave, converting the analog signal to digital and then back to analog is decidedly not the route I’d recommend.

FWIW - I take my scotch neat, I grind my own coffee and drink it black, and I prefer my sports cars with a manual transmission.

YMMV, just my $.03, etc., etc., etc.

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36

Sounds like a good plan BY. I’d say don’t go lower than a Rega P6 level deck to give your inherited record collection a fair chance to show you what it’s about. If that then doesn’t get your interest, sell the deck and the records and save yourself some b@llsache!

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I reckon that’s very good sound advice KJC

I know a number of people who are into streaming and CD’s and thought they should try out getting back into vinyl

Problem is they went out and purchased very cheap turntables , thought they were crap so got turned off

One needs to spend a decent amount of cash on a decent TT, not over the top at all

Otherwise forget it

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38

Unlike some, My Animals was fine, and the new DSOTM Wembley was fine too

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Dipping your toe in and not committing to belt changes and servicing but getting a deck that is up to the minimum level suitable for the 222 phono stage would probably, in my mind, mean having a demo of a Technics deck. I don’t say this just because I have one (I have another deck too), They make decks at the right sort of price point and low fuss level that you are talking about. Probably SL-1500C is you minimum starting point up to SL-1200G. This is purely a price and usability suggestion. Obviously a Rega or LP12 or a whole bunch of others are going to sound superb and may be sonically more to you liking. But the Technics decks can go decades without a service and they’re serious bits of hifi despite the looks - though a black SL-1210 would probably look like it was made for a 222.

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Definitely a +1 from me for a Technics of some description.

A Vertere DG1 might be an option. It is belt drive, but the belt looks easy to replace. The bearing is supposed to be maintenance free for its life. Which could be just a self fulfilling prophecy of course! Black or white I think they look pretty great too. I did demo one a while back, I felt it was let down by imaging, though I was listening with the Magneto cartridge which might have had something to do with it. Worth a listen maybe.