I moved way up from some Trio thing (I can’t badmouth it, though…it started me on the trail to the Linn )
Oh I was worse… I had a Goldring 101, before the Rega…
And… (gulp) an Amstrad amp… Before my A&R A60…
Snap! A60 here too (replaced a Kenwood amp).
Lovely little thing, the A&R.
Yes, until I listened to a thing called the 42/110… All went wrong there…
32/SNAPS/250 for me.
Wish I had a time machine and a healthy bank account: I’d be the Naim version of Imelda Marcos
I went in stages:
42 - 110
42- SNAPS - 110
42-5- SNAPS-250
42-5-HiCap-250
And I still have the HiCap & the 250…
I still have the 32 and (somewhere) the SNAPS. Had to sell the 250 when I was broke a few years ago. Always regretted letting that go.
My 250 has been at the core of my system, ever since I bought it. It has driven now 3 sets of speakers and run with 5 different Preamps (42-5, 72, 102, 72 & now 82).
Oh… and just the one Linn Sondek LP12… but with 2 different arms and I think 5 different carts…
The Krystal is a step up from the Klyde in all areas, most notably I would say in instrument separation & overall finesse of the entire sound. I have not heard an Akiva so can’t comment here I’m afraid.
I have a Kore & Karousel & both were improvements. I feel the Kore & Krystal were sensible, balanced upgrades well matched to the rest of my system.
I have said on several other threads on this forum that the Karousel was, by far, the biggest & most cost effective improvement ever made to my Linn. I don’t like to ascribe % improvements to sound but will make an exception in the Karousels case & say that I believe it was in the order of 10%.
In my experience/opinion, the Kore/Karousel route is the first one you should seriously consider. Keel I suppose if you can afford it & are looking to install an Ekos & cartridge above the Krystal in the future.
Sounds as if you may have an expensive 2022!
Tying up the last few posts in this thread there does seem to be a couple of common factors.
1 Once people got their LP12, developing their systems was made a lot easier as the source just ‘sounded right’ & meant it could be taken for granted even in its most basic form whilst other areas of the system could be upgraded (amps, speakers) in the confidence that if things still didn’t sound right, it wasn’t the TT. Upgrades to the Linn refined the sound rather than fixed any problems with it, because, to most of us, it sounded pretty good from day one.
2 Back in the day, if you, like me, couldn’t afford Naim, A & R A60 was the way to go for an awful lot of us!
Basic LP12 & A60 - first rung on the ‘real’ Hi Fi ladder for many of us.
Thanks for that. In fact I upgraded to an Ekos2 just before the EkosSE came out
IMO it was a well thought out set of upgrades for this year and let’s see about 2022 . For sure the LP12 needs some attention but I want to make sure of the best route to do the upgrades there. I missed the 50% offer of kore and karousel which was probably a mistake.
Which protractor do you recommend for LP12 + Jelco SA-250ST?
Just unboxed my LP12. Unfortunatly few drops of oil has gone leak even though the black cap was on. I took away what I could with a cloth but you can still see some fading in this area. Is there anything I can put on to make this plate more clean? It’s brushed stainless steel, right? I have had my fights with my kitchen fan and fridge in stainless steal and have some great stuff to clean this (made for this purpose only)
Any degreaser e.g.glass cleaner should do it, just wipe in the direction of the grain. And don’t touch the wood.
Ballistol
Try IPA (*) or Meths first, then White Spirit…
(* - No NOT India Pale Ale…!!))
Although that will make it seem better
Enough of it and there will be no problem at all…!!
That did it! Thanks!