Entry level turntable

If you do go to the vinyl bandwagon and with the level of your system, i agree with the others, go with Rega P3.

If I wanted a physical medium for playing music now, I would go CDs. I would not buy a turntable and start buying LPs.

I would stick to streaming if I was in your position, so it’s a “no” from me :slightly_smiling_face:

If your goal is to impress your friends or visitors, buy a Mag Lev turntable. A bit more than P1 but the whaouh will be bigger.

IMG_2296

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Or a Wheel Minot turntable.

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Is that a real turntable, floating on air?

I think it’s the kickstarter project one. Looks cool but goes against the fundamental principal of locking the arm in relation to the centre of the spindle.

Entry level turntable- don’t do it. I tried this and I found it just didn’t work. Spend the money on a better streamer or drop the streamer and get a better turntable.

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Please don’t restart the vinyl vs. digital discussion again …

I can only share my own story here; when I went to my dealer to talk about a possible entry level turntable for my Uniti Nova, I ended up with a Rega P8 … beautifully crafted and maybe overkill for my 100+ LP collection, but I really love the physical aspect of playing records and the feeling of ‘owning’ something …

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Assuming the platter is well balanced the magnetic levitation may well keep it centred as long as nothing nudges/jogs it - possibly not to the same tolerance as might be achievable mechanically, but then I doubt many records have absolutely perfect concentricity.

But I wonder if it stops and lowers (or a support raises) for changing records and what that process is like, as I imagine it would be quite wobbly doing that. (Edit: Being curious I looked, and it has supports that rise automatically when it stops rotating.)

Based on the original question get a Rega p1 eco in red which gives you a p3 plinth and bearing for £199, get a glass platter off eBay, so for £299 it’s cheap and sounds good enough for what you want. If it gives you the bug you can upgrade, if not you’ll most likely get your money back selling it on. That’s what I’ve done.

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Hope you’re not referring to my comment had it had nothing to do with digital v vinly. It was about the quality (some of course) of cheap turntables.

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Hi Pete, certainly not!

Just a general thought :wink:

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@sihctr A few thoughts…

From the perspective of someone who only recently got back into vinyl (a few years ago now). If starting from scratch and unless you are able to buy a curated collection at a decent price, or inherit a collection, then I have to agree with the naysayers…

  • Vinyl is a flawed medium.
  • Records are fragile.
  • Buying new and used is expensive.
  • All records (including new vinyl) need cleaning.
  • Collectively they are awkward and heavy to store.
  • Buying used is challenging due to vendor description of the records.
  • New vinyl pressing quality is variable - warps, surface noise, non-fill etc.
  • An intro deck is not going to be on par with you primary digital source.

But… You only live once and it can be very rewarding building a record collection!

I can’t exaggerate how much I’ve enjoyed liberating my old collection from the loft, the (idiotic) amount of time lavished on reviving each LP with a Record Cleaning Machine, re-sleeving the records and the outer jackets, organising the storage, setting up a record player optimally, and now thoroughly enjoying visiting record fairs and second hand record shops again. And of course, to pore over the lavish LP jacket designs and the inner sleeves, which of course is impossible with a stream or download.

Overall, even with my turntable placed in a work environment, I now use vinyl as a primary source and tend to find the music played on vinyl more engaging overall, but this is more than likely due to my compromised digital source as opposed to the virtues of the vinyl medium itself (a whole other debate). Whether my vinyl honeymoon will last, who knows, as I do find cleaning the vinyl the biggest faff of all, but for now I’m thoroughly enjoying the medium.

Good luck if you decide to move forward with a turntable, and keep the forum bods updated with your progress.

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You make some good points and prompt me to re-think things a bit. I would probably still struggle with digital music streamed all day long, despite the Spotify improvements - not had Tidal for a long time. Analogue recorded music played in the office on my vintage Linn/Naim system gives me a lot of pleasure and never gets tiresome. But for digital recordings from mid 80s onwards, then a streamer (or possibly CD player) seems the best way forward, especially for dedicated listening of an hour or so.

Here are the rules:
Don’t trust anyone who tells you that you should not buy a TT
Don’t trust anyone who tells you that you should buy a TT
All of us here have our own views (as do I) and there are, clearly polar opposites. Do what works for you. Enjoy the music.

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Excellent assessment! :rofl:

Magnetic floating

I dunno…if you are at the nDAC level for streaming, I think you are going to need to go up the TT foodchain a ways. I would think about a new Planar 6, which I’ve written about elsewhere. You’re gonna need a RCM too.

I absolutely love vinyl, but the magic really doesn’t come alive until you’re at the midlevel. I’ve had several lesser Regas, and while I appreciated the fun factor, they are a long ways off the nDAC level…

Also you’ve missed the golden era of cheapie used stuff…I built my collection over the last 15 years of so, and my buying has dried up except for classical…I was shocked to see my collection valuation on Discogs…I’m not sure I would pursue if I were starting over.

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Spotify might not be the epitome of sound quality… I stream primarily from my own store of ripped or downloaded music, with Spotify just for checking out things new to me prior to purchase.

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