tzrider
Write Only User
I love those things. You can tap them with a framing hammer while playing and they won't skip.
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Any BARF Audiophiles?
- Thread starter DReg350
- Start date
I love those things. You can tap them with a framing hammer while playing and they won't skip.
TerryM
--/\~
... this will turn out to be just fine.
It'll be fine. As long as you're in the ballpark your music will sound sweet. Plenty of time to tweak later.
Mebbe so, but I'll not be hammerin my lovely plinth. For sure regular activities - walking, jumping, tremblers, etc. - don't set it off. I have a rigid VPi Aries that's equally unaffected by vibration.
Nice. If I were to upgrade my turntable today, right now, VPI would be at the top of my list.
TerryM
--/\~
Nice. If I were to upgrade my turntable today, right now, VPI would be at the top of my list.
Check the Shinola/VPi collaboration - Runwell Turntable
Dood, I saw that a few weeks ago. Gourgeous retro thing of beauty. Was DROOLING over the ad in Stereophile
... till I saw the price. 
Now I know that's nothin' in the land of audiophilia, but for me... Hawaii, Spain, Italy and now Hungary and Amsterdam aren't just calling. They scream. 
TerryM
--/\~
Hard to argue with travel. Then there's motorsicles.
(I wouldn't want that ugly old thing, anyway. Probably scratch up all your albums.)
(I wouldn't want that ugly old thing, anyway. Probably scratch up all your albums.)
Little update... settled on the Ortofon Super OM 20 cartridge. Found the turntable and cartridge manuals online and went to work. Discovered that my previous turntable cartridge had been wired incorrectly since day friggin' one. I've been doin it wrong the whole damn time.
Got that straightened out, the new cart installed, set the alignment, set the weight and the anti skate. Then dove into a stack of vinyl to see what I could find. The wife's Dad's Herb Alpert, The Fabulous Ventures, Talking Heads: 77, the Smithsonian Collection of Classic Jazz and more.
So I moved the whole mess into the family room. This is exactly what my wife did not want. Put on Herb Alpert while we sipped coffee and sent her back down memory lane to her childhood and her Dad. I have tunes in the family room again!
It's not the best set up I've ever heard, but it's the best I've ever had. I showed my son how to use it and told him to crank it. Have fun. Explore music. I showed him how to separate the speakers and where to place a chair in the sweet spot. He got to do a sax solo in jazz band at an off campus concert Friday using Glen Patterson's baritone sax.
Got that straightened out, the new cart installed, set the alignment, set the weight and the anti skate. Then dove into a stack of vinyl to see what I could find. The wife's Dad's Herb Alpert, The Fabulous Ventures, Talking Heads: 77, the Smithsonian Collection of Classic Jazz and more.
So I moved the whole mess into the family room. This is exactly what my wife did not want. Put on Herb Alpert while we sipped coffee and sent her back down memory lane to her childhood and her Dad. I have tunes in the family room again!
It's not the best set up I've ever heard, but it's the best I've ever had. I showed my son how to use it and told him to crank it. Have fun. Explore music. I showed him how to separate the speakers and where to place a chair in the sweet spot. He got to do a sax solo in jazz band at an off campus concert Friday using Glen Patterson's baritone sax.
russ69
Backside Slider
Pro tip: Don't try to run ultra low tracking forces, 2 grams works well on most rigs. The specs say 1.75 for the upper limit, so maybe start there. Do you have an oscilloscope to check the performance?
Hoho
Ride to Eat
I showed my son how to use it and told him to crank it. Have fun. Explore music. I showed him how to separate the speakers and where to place a chair in the sweet spot. He got to do a sax solo in jazz band at an off campus concert Friday using Glen Patterson's baritone sax.
Best part of this thread yet!
Well damn, Sam... had lunch with Johnkol yesterday. Thoroughly enjoyed meeting such a cool BARFer. 
We yacked about work, astronomy, motorcycles, Italy, travel, paleontology, religion and stereos. We covered a lot ground.
John brought several interconnects for me to test and play with; a very nice moving coil cartridge to test with my Budgie preamp; and a higher end phono preamp to compare to the Budgie as well. He's an amazingly well educated, well travelled, warm and generous human being.
I've been enjoying the heck out this setup. Drag and point the Swifts into the kitchen, blast and bake. I put all the gear on a cart, which provides a lot of placement flexibility. I'm going to custom build a new smaller cart. I'm looking to find a 1.5" to 2" butcher block counter top, saw it in to roughly 17" x 20" shelves and weld up a stainless steel frame. It'll be heavier and absorb more vibration, but be smaller, more compact. I saw a 72"x 24" x 2" maple top on Craigslist for $100 in Santa Rosa, but had no way get it home. Should have just bought it, cut it in half.
We yacked about work, astronomy, motorcycles, Italy, travel, paleontology, religion and stereos. We covered a lot ground. John brought several interconnects for me to test and play with; a very nice moving coil cartridge to test with my Budgie preamp; and a higher end phono preamp to compare to the Budgie as well. He's an amazingly well educated, well travelled, warm and generous human being.
I've been enjoying the heck out this setup. Drag and point the Swifts into the kitchen, blast and bake. I put all the gear on a cart, which provides a lot of placement flexibility. I'm going to custom build a new smaller cart. I'm looking to find a 1.5" to 2" butcher block counter top, saw it in to roughly 17" x 20" shelves and weld up a stainless steel frame. It'll be heavier and absorb more vibration, but be smaller, more compact. I saw a 72"x 24" x 2" maple top on Craigslist for $100 in Santa Rosa, but had no way get it home. Should have just bought it, cut it in half.
johnkol
Active member
Thank you for your kind words Greg, it was a pleasure meeting you, and I had a great time.
As far as vibration isolation is concerned, you already have the best weapon against structural-borne vibrations: your concrete slab. That still leaves air-borne vibrations, but it is almost impossible to control these in a domestic setting (the standard solution is to move the source equipment to a different room from the speakers).
If you want to experiment, try some sorbothane feet under the equipment to see what effect this has; use this table to determine which ones to get based on the weight of each component you are trying to isolate.
As far as vibration isolation is concerned, you already have the best weapon against structural-borne vibrations: your concrete slab. That still leaves air-borne vibrations, but it is almost impossible to control these in a domestic setting (the standard solution is to move the source equipment to a different room from the speakers).
If you want to experiment, try some sorbothane feet under the equipment to see what effect this has; use this table to determine which ones to get based on the weight of each component you are trying to isolate.
Thanks John, and those weren't kind words. Those were truth. You're a kind and generous soul with both information and material. I'm truly humbled and sincerely thank you.
I was schooled today. I've apparently made enough decent purchasing decisions to get the attention of an audiophile who's budget is light years beyond mine. I was given an invitation to bring some music for an audition on his system. OMG! I could sell all my equipment for top dollar and not be able to pay for his TT cartridge alone or just one speaker cable.
Does it make a difference? Oh yeah. It's a high end Corvette, mid range Ferrari, a really custom bike or car. The TT was jaw droppingly wicked cool bitchin' awesome are you fuggin' kidding me?
So I'm home now. Listening to my rig. I need a Primluna amp.
I was schooled today. I've apparently made enough decent purchasing decisions to get the attention of an audiophile who's budget is light years beyond mine. I was given an invitation to bring some music for an audition on his system. OMG! I could sell all my equipment for top dollar and not be able to pay for his TT cartridge alone or just one speaker cable.
Does it make a difference? Oh yeah. It's a high end Corvette, mid range Ferrari, a really custom bike or car. The TT was jaw droppingly wicked cool bitchin' awesome are you fuggin' kidding me?
So I'm home now. Listening to my rig. I need a Primluna amp.
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TerryM
--/\~
Told you it's a slippery slope.
I have a preamp back at the mfr getting a phonostage added, among other things. The guy is ready to start and asked whether I wanted it for moving coil or moving magnet cartridge (duh, hadn't even thought to tell him). He said his amps for low output MCs are really good. Dang, now I have to think about buying a better cartridge.
I have a preamp back at the mfr getting a phonostage added, among other things. The guy is ready to start and asked whether I wanted it for moving coil or moving magnet cartridge (duh, hadn't even thought to tell him). He said his amps for low output MCs are really good. Dang, now I have to think about buying a better cartridge.
johnkol
Active member
I would have said that this is never a good idea (how can you ever go back to driving a Corolla?), but how can you turn down an offer like that?
Thankfully I've never heard a system that sounded so exceptional that I had to get it. I lust after the awesome power of PA systems at live venues, but the fidelity is simply not there.
So what kind of equipment did you listen to?
Turntable: SME 30/12
Tonearm: Phantom with more than one arm and cartridge
Main Cartridge: Koetsu Onyx
Amp: Plinius Solid State
Mono Turntable: Rega RP3 with Ortofon Mono 2M SE
Speakers: Harbeth Monitor 40.2 Pros and they were glorious.
CD Transport: Don't remember, but it was cool. Manual open and close. No gears or motor.
DAC: Naim.
Cables and interconnects: Nordost. OMG!
Line conditioners, spikes a gogo and so much more.
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johnkol
Active member
I certainly do. I'm glad it found a new purpose in its life.
You weren't kidding, those tonearm cables look serious.
Did you get a chance to compare the Sumiko to the Ortofon?
Turntable: SME 30/12
Tonearm: Phantom with more than one arm and cartridge
Main Cartridge: Koetsu Onyx
Amp: Plinius Solid State
Mono Turntable: Rega RP3 with Ortofon Mono 2M SE
Speakers: Harbeth Monitor 40.2 Pros and they were glorious.
CD Transport: Don't remember, but it was cool. Manual open and close. No gears or motor.
DAC: Naim.
Cables and interconnects: Nordost. OMG!
Line conditioners, spikes a gogo and so much more.
That's a really interesting system: SME 30 with Harbeth? His cartridge alone is probably worth as much as the speakers.
A friend had an SME 20, but with an SME IV arm. It was an impressive deck, but a bit overpriced. Never had the chance to listen to Harbeth speakers, but they always had this reputation of trying to stick as close as possible to the "BBC Monitor" sound.
Did you take any music with you to see how it sounds in his system?
The headshell leads are silver. Got them from a source in England. Only cost ~$40. The Sumiko didn't seem quite as full sounding as the Ortofon. Part of that is because it's a high output moving coil and the output voltage is lower than my Ortofon moving magnet cartridge. Even though my phono preamp says it supports high output moving coils, it doesn't do so very well. But, once I cleaned the sumiko's sylus it seemed to open the sound up even if I can't get the same higher max volume that I can from the Ortofon. Mobile Fidelity MoFi LP#9 Stylus Cleaner and a stylus brush is da bomb. Highly recommend.
Wealth is relative... I guess. To me, he spent a fortune on his system, but then I just looked at a pair of Wavestream V8 mono blocks that cost $75,000.00 for the pair. His vinyl collection was extensive, so I pulled out several albums that I had been recently listening to on my system. Big difference. As much as I'm enjoying my system, it's a Miata compared to Ford GT40s, Ferraris, and Bugatis. There's a huge difference. I'd love to get an Air Tight amp, but at $10,000.00... I'd rather take my wife to Europe again.
As several of you have pointed out... slippery slope... indeed. It's an addictive hobby.
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TerryM
--/\~
Some Harbeths have gotten pretty expensive. I think those are ~$14K.
Me neither but would like to hear them some day.
Got wind of the California Audio Show in Oakland in July - www.caaudioshow.com. I haven't been to one since several years ago in SF and may check it out. Currently $10 for 3-day pass. Not the best place for serious auditioning but you get to see a lot. Harbeths will probably there.