Help me with my return to the vinyl fold.

Love it or hate it, it just won't stop
Cressy Snr
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#46 Re: Help me with my return to the vinyl fold.

Post by Cressy Snr »

Maybe it's a chronic sensitivity to phase distortion.
I noticed Steve's speakers were out of phase straight away, when Nick was plumbing his 300B amp into them.
and I was only walking past. Nobody else had noticed at all.
So what I really need is a TT, arm cart combination that is absolutely phase coherent at upper mid/HF.
A tall order probably. Do they even measure this or is it even possible to measure this property?
Last edited by Cressy Snr on Wed Jun 29, 2016 8:04 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Greg
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#47 Re: Help me with my return to the vinyl fold.

Post by Greg »

Even more interesting, Steve. I don't think I get what you hear at all. I thought David's Clear Audio/Longdog/Edingdale MkII demo was probably the most balanced and listenable I heard on the Saturday before we had to leave.
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#48 Re: Help me with my return to the vinyl fold.

Post by Cressy Snr »

I agree Greg. The Clearaudio and associated gear, was great. But for me, there was a subliminal irritation to some of the vinyl listening and it was there on Daft Punk, but not on the Ian Shaw track David played last.
I get no subliminal irritation with digital, where most hi-fi buffs do, hence the overwhelming preference for the black stuff among most audiophiles and magazine reviewers.
Last edited by Cressy Snr on Wed Jun 29, 2016 9:01 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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#49 Re: Help me with my return to the vinyl fold.

Post by Greg »

As a result of Owston, I have streamed that Daft Punk album. Can't hear anything you have commented on. Have you tried streaming it to make comparison with Dave's vinyl version?
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#50 Re: Help me with my return to the vinyl fold.

Post by Cressy Snr »

Yep I have it in digital format and there is no sign of the "problem"
Interestingly enough, the fuzz (excessive warmth?) is hardly there at all with unipivot arms.
I auditioned a Naim Aro years ago on an LP12 and it was a unique experience.
Regrettably I got made redundant and could no longer afford one. By the time I could, I had lost interest in vinyl,
because of it's "dirty" sound compared to the preternatural clarity of digital.

However I have high hopes for the Mayware Formula IV you let me have. If it sounds as good as the Aro, I heard 25 years ago then I will be very happy with vinyl as my other source.
Proper tracking and a unipivot arm, may just be the combination that swings it.
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#51 Re: Help me with my return to the vinyl fold.

Post by IslandPink »

Fingers crossed you'll get that result which I found to be the case and I why I stick with the M.F.iv in recent years. It has a cleaner upper mid and treble with more tone up there than anything else I tried.
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#52 Re: Help me with my return to the vinyl fold.

Post by Cressy Snr »

I'll be starting the Mayware rebuild tomorrow.
Cue the "helping hands" clamp system, complete with built-in magnifier. :)
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#53 Re: Help me with my return to the vinyl fold.

Post by Cressy Snr »

Ordered this double LP set yesterday from the Ace Records website in a fit of madness.
Bought it on CD years ago and since then have collected all the subsequent "Mod Jazz" releases.

Looking forward to giving these LPs a spin and digging come crazy beats.

http://acerecords.co.uk/mod-jazz-1
Last edited by Cressy Snr on Sun Jul 03, 2016 4:45 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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#54 Re: Help me with my return to the vinyl fold.

Post by Paul Barker »

Thanks for that Steve, I like it.
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#55 Re: Help me with my return to the vinyl fold.

Post by Cressy Snr »

All of the Mod Jazz series are great compilations; well worth investigating.
Only the first release is available on vinyl at the moment. Hopefully we'll see more coming out.
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#56 Re: Help me with my return to the vinyl fold.

Post by Cressy Snr »

So far so good.
The Lenco/Mayware/Shure combo is providing me with the most enjoyment I've had from vinyl in years.
Because of the relative age of my record collection, I'm unavoidably in the eighties for some of the time.
There's a lot of variety, in fact a surprising amount of decent music in the soul and jazz idiom from that decade.

BUT...Why oh why from 1986 to 88 did a certain section of mainstream artists, including some who ought to have known better, have to have had those godawful bloody gated electric drums turned up to eleven on everything?
The further through the decade you go, the worse it gets. A dose of Gloria Estefan and the Miami Sound Machine followed by Huey Lewis, Will Downing and "Smooth Criminal" by Jacko and you feel as if you have been beaten around the head with a baseball bat. The offending items are almost certainly headed for the tip.

By far, the best sounding LPs in my collection tend to come from the 50s, 60s, and 70s. Does this make me a boring old fart? :lol:
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#57 Re: Help me with my return to the vinyl fold.

Post by Nick »

Isn't "gated electric drums" a contradiction? Or do you mean the gated drum samples?
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#58 Re: Help me with my return to the vinyl fold.

Post by Cressy Snr »

Yes them bloody things too :lol:
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#59 Re: Help me with my return to the vinyl fold.

Post by Cressy Snr »

Had an hilarious session this afternoon with the vinyl. I dedided to pull out some of my 80s vinyl and try it out.
Maxi Priest, Suzanne Vega, Edie Brickell and the New Bohemians, Don Henley, Spandau Ballet, The Pasadenas, Huey Lewis and the News and Fleetwood Mac.

With the noticeable exception of Solitude Standing by Vega, and True by Spandau, which I listened to all the way through both sides, the rest were pretty odd sounding affairs-trademark 80s, impossible to associate with any other decade.

Much as I can spot autotune a mile away (yes you Mickey Bubble) I can spot an Aural Exciter at 100 paces with cotton wool in my ears.
The worst offenders were Edie Brickell, Lyndsey Buckingham, Stevie Nicks, Huey Lewis and Don Henley. I can't abide the artificial sheen that the exciter puts over voices and as the thing gets worked harder, the more high order harmonics it generates, and the worse, that breathy, brash vocal sound that'll cut through the airwaves gets YEUUUGH!

Put an Aphex Aural Exciter or equivalent processor on the AKG mic'd lead voice, loud gated drum samples on the drum kit and you get my idea of hell on earth. American 80s pop albums in my collection seem to be the worst offenders.
I don't know which is worse, the loudness wars or the 80s.

More stuff for the charity shop. :lol:
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Cressy Snr
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#60 Re: Help me with my return to the vinyl fold.

Post by Cressy Snr »

After the unfortunate incident with the cat and the bent AT440mlb stylus, I bent the cantilever back straight, with a pair of duckbill pliers and all worked nicely. However I couldn't help thinking I might be damaging my records, so the AT was taken out and the Shure M97EX cart was reinstalled.

Trouble was, after the clarity of the AT440, the Shure felt somewhat lacking at the top end. Enter the Audio Technica ATF7 MC cart.

Our Ant brought his old one plus a Denon HA500 head amp round. I fitted the ATF7 to the Mayware arm and wired the head amp between the turntable and the NVA Phono1. I must say, the ATF7 is a pretty good sounding cart; nice and smooth with impeccable tracking, a super midrange, excellent top detail and a fine overall balance. Relaxed, musical and refined is a fine trio of adjectives that would describe the sound of this MC.

Works great in the low mass Mayware arm, tracking at 2 grams. Doesn't time quite as well down below as the AT440 moving magnet cartridge does, but then lots of MMs in my experience tend to have better bass timing than low end moving coils. Nevertheless, the ATF7 will do nicely until I can replace the AT440. At least my records are safe.
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