To those with multiple tables/arms/cartridges

Halcro, I see, so we both have TW, FR66s in common and now Grotrian as well! I have a Grotrian 192 in standard gloss piano black. Grotrian make some of the best upright pianos that I have ever tried and when I came across an excellent offer for 192, I just could not pass it up.

Suteetat,
My Model 120 was a Grotrian Steinweg from the 1920s (voted the greatest upright ever made) and was indeed a beautiful sounding instrument.

I seems indeed that we have much in common.
Now tell me that you drive a 1963 Porsche 356 like this and we'll be blood brothers? :-)

I thought this was about fun....and the many roads that can get you there. From the dogged empiricism of our Mexican friend where even an inch misalignment of your posterior at 80db on your favorite listening chair can mean missing the holy grail, to the endless variety of numerous carts and arms coupled with an aural acuity that can summon either Lorin Manzel or Claudio Abbado in attendance with the Chicago or whatever symphony at a venue of your choosing , to the Teutonic effluence of some and its implicit condescension....IMHO we take ourselves too seriously and crave acceptance for our idiosyncrasies .
One, two or more, carts, arms and TTs, how does it matter, so long as you can delude yourself and your better half that you think you are having fun...
Relax and Njoy

A question for Syntax.....
Do you think that your ability to decide on the one turntable, arm. cartridge and phono-stage perfect for you.....had anything to do with having several turntables and many arms and cartridges in your own system to compare?

Sunnyboy1956,
fun is upgreadable! try it :-)

Dear Halcro,
why are we talking about limiting? The word limit itself is something I do very hard in most life environments. Maybe better: Take it to the limit... vroom!

Halcro, unfortunately my car is an 11 years old Honda CRV and my major transportation mode is walking as it only take me 15 minutes by foot to get to work but in Bangkok traffic, it may take me up to 30-45 minutes by car to go the same distance. I use on average about 1 tank of gas a month in my car so a good car is a big waste on me :(
I think the cost of my TW and Reed 3Q/FR-66s, Air Tight and Lyra costs quite a bit more than current market value of my car by quite a bit! Not sure if that is a good or bad thing.

I never had a chance to hear vintage Grotrian but had a chance to play on a few vintage Erard and Pleyel that were kept in excellent condition. I am sure it must be wonderful.
I would say current Grotrian upright is still one of the best up there with current production piano. A few years ago, I was in Geneva and visited few piano stores that had a few Grotrian uprights, Bluthner, Sauter and C. Bechstein among others and I had a lot of fun trying them all out and thanks to the piano stores that were generous enough to let me try them even though they knew that I was not looking to buy a new piano at that time.

Back to original topic, I think I need at the very least 2 arms and 2 cartridges though, one stereo and one mono!

Sonnyboy, I thought in the same way and wrote accordingly.
So you either missed my post or you don't like my humor.
I hope the first mentioned possibility was the case. However
I also omitted the contributions from some Mexican.

Limits? In the words of William Blake: "the bounded is loathed by its possessor."

And besides, "you never know what is enough until you know what is more than enough."

Wrm 57, We need clear answers not riddles. Say: the limits
of my bank account for example.

A question for Syntax.....
Do you think that your ability to decide on the one turntable, arm. cartridge and phono-stage perfect for you.....had anything to do with having several turntables and many arms and cartridges in your own system to compare?

Yes and No
At the beginning I had the typical review winner System, I was proud being a modern Audiophile. But short after that I met a record collector who demoed me his system and I was totally confused. His was different from hardware and was sounding light years better. So we started talking and he taught me what is responsible for what....
The next big step was in the following 10 years when I travelled a lot to listen to Audiophiles privately, here I learned the most, what I would like to have or to try, and what not. Later it was narrowed with Audiophiles who also had 2 turntables, 2 identical Arms, carts....and we made the comparisons and when you do it right, you have to be honest to you, there is a big difference between "I like it" and "That Design is better"...
But no matter what I made, there always was that question mark of "Is that Arm/cart I don't have better than that I have?"
Well, I always try to understand what a unit can do. There are no wonders from outer space. It is brain. Nothing else. And some Designers are better than others. Marketing can hide that very successfully but my own comparisons showed me that week for week. And when a 8k cartridge is absolutely inferior in comparison to a 2k cartridge, then there are only 2 ways: To deny that, or to think about that.
(Sorry, there is a 3. way: I spend so much money and that one has to be better and honestly, I don't care anyway)
After all those years I asked me at the end of each month "With what units did you listen the most time? AND WHY?"
I found the answers.
And the final question was "Why should I spend my time listening to something which is not as good as the other stuff I have?"
My time of doing nothing, sitting in a sofa, looking into the nothing between 2 speakers is the most valuable time I can waste.
I want to do the best with it.

Dear Thuchan,

why are we talking about limiting? The word limit itself is something I do very hard in most life environments. Maybe better: Take it to the limit... vroom!

You know.....I think you're right! :-)

And when a 8k cartridge is absolutely inferior in comparison to a 2k cartridge, then there are only 2 ways: To deny that, or to think about that.

This is what I also found.
When a 21st century $4,000 or $5,000 or $10,000 dollar LOMC is outperformed by a 20th century $1,500 LOMC......I shake my head.

And when a 30 year old vintage MM cartridge can be better than ALL of them.....I simply wonder at the gullibility of audiophiles world-wide.

There are fortunately, some amongst us....like the Professor (Timeltel)....who has the knowledge to 'philosophically' INVENT a new cartridge?
A 'Franken-cartridge' whereby he takes the body of a vintage MM like the AT-13Ea....and by modifying the stylus assembly of the AT-155Lc....he melds the two together to produce a cartridge for a few hundred dollars which just sounds amazing!
Yet so few will ever hear one?

Dear Halcro,

the "taking to the limits" process includes also sideways, not necessarily the most efficient ones. To be honest who among us looking for different combinations did not end up with a failure or a mismatch sometime?
So what? Yes! Definitely yes! we were not born with the best sounding system bought by our parents. Experimentation gets along with good and bad results. But this is the way how to find out what is worth going for and what you wanna keep in your system or not.
Before I concentrated on improving my system in my listening room (btw also learning that it is different experimenting in a big or small room) I went to some audiophiles listening to their system always returning that they only wanted to hear "everything is fine". I also learned that the ones who are the most critical are the most sensitive when talking about their system or special units.

From this point on I decided not running around and not trusting any sales or marketing promises nor advices from so called church apostles or gurus rather exchanging opinions among real friends. I just had a funny experience when the publisher of a German Audio Magazine recommended a certain CD player (quite a new and very expensive one) to me. It was a friendly recommendation of the kind, just listen to it. My reply was: Bring it to me, we listen to it in my system and we will see whether it will beat the existing four digital systems or not. So far I got no answer.

In some matters it took me longer reaching my aim, e.g. idlers. I had some in my system and do know what the difference is, also with belt driven and direct driven tables. I know that some guys do not like idlers, maybe beause they got in touch with inferior or not very well matched combinations. Some otheres swear on the idlers' characteristics. On other topics I succeeded pretty fast and was absolutely happy with the outcome, e.g. R2R or some vintage tonearms - and I am still very happy with those ones.

I think that all depends on one's taste and the challenge you are going for - and of course the kind of investment (in time and spending) you are willing to sacrifice to multiple installations. And yes in some way - as Sunnyboy1956 (btw a very good year) indicated- it is a matter of how crazy or barking mad we allow ourselves to become.

Dear Henry, Many of us were to slow to grasp what Herr
Professor was talking about. But when we got this German
'Acha Erlebnis' many of us started with 'surgury' study.
It is now called 'cutting' and 'screwing' depending on the
stylus holder type. But putting ,say, the stylus from an
AT 13 EA in the stylus holder of your beloved AT 155
CL give us some sardonic kind of pleasure. My advice
when purchasing second hand carts: ask for the macro-
scopic pictures of the stylus.

Regards, Halcro: Good to hear you're enjoying the Frankencart. If given a name, as is sometimes done, Serendipity would be appropriate. Like John Bunyan's hero Pilgrim, some wander, hoping for a certain destination but meanwhile find the way strewn with lessons.

Fifteen or so varieties of headshells here, just an enthusiast. If audio aficionados were to be described as univores/omnivores----

Peace,

Nandric, try this Blakean riddle on for size:

The truth can never be told so as to be understood, and not be believed.

Translated into audio: if the music moves you, the system does, too. That's a truth known to all music lovers if not all audiophiles.

Timeltel, your reference to Pilgrim is right on. As a sometime mountain climber, I usually find the peaks to be the least interesting part of the climb.

Hello all,

I have just found this very interesting thread and discovered many familiar prior acquaintances.
Hi Halco, Syntax, Pryso, my comrade Nadric, Lewn, Sonnyboy 1956, The Professor (Timeltel), Thuchan, and others. Do I smell muntinity?
I hope I'm welcomed aboard. Reads like this could be quite a fun/informative thread. Already on my 2nd reread!

Regards,
Don

Welcome Don,
We always enjoy your contributions.
Regards
Henry

Thuchan
"Sunnyboy1956 (btw a very good year)..."
Obviously , the year of my birth.. :-)
Had sent you a PM regarding the Wavacs sometime back.
Apologies to the OP for the digression and taking the this OT, but we may be on to something as momentous and innocuous as MF's SRA:
MTA - Mirth Tracking Angle
Have a great weekend
Pradeep

Sunnyboy1956,
mine too! congrats. Oh it was you, sorry I get so many questions, sometimes when I do not know the person I oversee, sorry.
can you send me again. Thanks.

Hi Halco,

I can not stop looking at your TT-101 photo. What an amazing set-up. If you lived somewhere in the US, I would be asking you about those armpods. Hell, I'll ask anyway!
You say you had them cast. Was this done at a foundry using molds that you made? If so, do you still have the molds?
Before I ask you "the" big question, how about telling me how much the mold weighed.
I ask because I'm hunting down a DD Turntable,hopefully a TT-101 but would settle for a TT-81 if the price was right.
I already have a granite slab cut for it all to sit on. Just waiting for the right one to come along.
Regards,
Don

Hey, I just noticed a (edit my post) notice at the bottom of my latest post! Perhaps something new from Audiogon?
Now, if we could only post actual pictures!

Hi Don,

Thanks for the kind words :-)
Here is a different view of the TT-81 and here is another.
Yes....I still have the wood moulds that the foundry made from my design drawings. How the wood doesn't catch fire with the molten bronze I don't understand?
In any case.....the wood moulds are quite light (less than a kilo)...and here and here are the resulting armpods in rough and finished states.

I wish you luck in finding your Victor turntable. The TT-81 is not so difficult to find...and is very good.
The TT-101....in good working order....is almost a mythical creature.
Just ask Banquo and Lewm? :-(

Don,
To see how to post 'actual pictures' on A'Gon.....click on the 'markup tags' at the bottom of the 'Your response' box.
The picture you want to post can't just be directly from your computer library.
It needs a Web address (ie...its own url).
To give it one....you need to upload your computer photos to a photo-sharing Website like Picassa or many others. They are free.

However it's still a little tricky to follow the system to get them on this Forum?
I've been trying to teach Thuchan for 3 years now.....but even he has given up? :-)

Regards
Henry

I realised of course....that the bronze casting was in sand, and that the 'positive' wood moulds I had.....were for creating the 'negative' moulds in the sand.
Here is a video of the casting process which is very interesting.
Machining was not required for my pods as they were filled, sanded and painted in an automotive shop.

Is this thread about the joys and woes of owning multiple turntables, or is it about justifying one's decision to own multiple turntables? The latter topic is a bore.

You have some woes to discuss Lew?

Dear Halcro,
indeed loading images in a thread on this platform does need an introductionary course which not everyone will pass, you did succesfully and Syntax and some others. But there are still some who are left behind...
In the age of modern computing loading images should be a user friendly one step approach directly from the computer, everything else is somehow like working at stone age. I thought when Agon modernized the platform they would modernize this feature too - obviously not!
So I am left behind as a kind of dinosaurus. my choice was that all my system images are stored and displayed at a simple place...

Oh Lewm, come on you with many tables, arms and carts is asking such a question :-) of course it is about the combination of all, tables are part of the game. Or did I misread something?
Complexity is a rather complex issue... so most people tend reducing complexity which obviously makes life easier. The downside is you will never experience some "On Top Issues" like I did when experimenting with the Cooperhead and Cobra arm. As these arms are not really user friendly for changing carts they provide a pretty fine soundstage with a good cart like the Olympos or Goldfinger v2. It is so different you need to hear it.

Dear Lew, The right expression for the first part of your
thesis is the somehow conservative looking: 'the proudness
of ownership'. The justifying part is for the married omong
us and probably for the Weber's protestants and Marx Marxist.

What easier way is there to compare cartridges than to mount two arms on one table with identical arms and play them both at the same time, switching between inputs to hear them each play the same album, seconds apart. Maybe some of you have a good enough memory to wait to change cartridges between plays, but not me. So, I can have arm to hold my main cartridge, and the other to hold any contenders for the throne. Or one stereo and one mono. Or one MM and the other MC. or whatever other foolishness my heart desires. And still take up only the space of one table.

Dear Manitunc, This may be the easy way to compare two carts but I have no problem at all to compare two carts after each other on the same tonearm. I have no idea how
'long' our musical memory is but 5 -6 minutes needed to change the carts will not 'disturbe' our memory. That is exactly what I deed today. Comparing Miyabi Standard with the Kiseki Goldspot in my FR-64s. I have a pritty good idea what the differences are.

Dear Henry, Perhaps I was thinking of the lyric from "I've grown accustomed to her face", Henry Higgins' lament from My Fair Lady:

"Her joys, her woes
Her highs, her lows
Are second nature to me now
Like breathing out and breathing in
I was serenely independent
And content (with one turntable) before we met
Surely I can always be that way again
And yet
I've grown accustomed to her look
Accustomed to her voice(s)
Accustomed to her face(s)."

Which is why I don't think I can go back to one turntable, even though I was satisfied with one turntable all my life until 4-5 years ago. You may as well ask Casanova why he needed so many women.

Henry, OT, but it's your thread and you own a TT101: I have had no problem finding oodles of correct NOS ICs to replace the clock IC in the TT101. I am going to buy several from a vendor in China, in case my TT101 is in need. Bill Thalmann says this is the Achilles heel of the TT101, and he has never been able to find the chip for sale, but I think he limits his search to the USA.

Dear Thuchan,

In the age of modern computing loading images should be a user friendly one step approach directly from the computer, everything else is somehow like working at stone age.

I couldn't agree with you more.
Instead of all the young Turks spending their time developing mobile Apps for the chance of striking it rich?........if some of them could work out a 1 or 2 button way to upload photos from your computer directly to a site like this Forum......we'd all be better off?

As Thuchan, Manitunc and Nandric have mentioned.......
There are several issues and methods possible for the use of arms to compare various cartridges?
Manitunc correctly states that one turntable fitted with two or more identical arms...is the most valid way to compare different cartridges whilst Nandric points out that using an arm with interchangeable headshells....allows for the same result albeit a few minutes delay for the changing of shells, VTA and VTF.
Thuchan points out the difficulty of changing cartridges on arms with 'fixed' headshells.....and I can identify with him in cursing the Copperhead arm as THE most difficult example of these I have ever experienced.
Having said that.......the Copperhead (and Cobra) arm is also the greatest sounding arm with the widest variety of cartridges (especially MMs) I have ever heard.
So the answer for me and Thuchan.....is to decide on which cartridge to 'weld' onto the Copperhead and Cobra arms....and leave them there for a loooong time :-)

On the face of it.....Manitunc's solution of having 2 identical arms on the one turntable appears ideal, yet one of the vagaries of turntable-based playback, is that different cartridges perform better in different arms.
So hearing differences between cartridges in Manitunc's scenario....may be nothing more than a 'matching' issue?

To avoid some of these issues, I have found just over the last 3 years.......that having many tonearms, most with interchangeable headshells....mounted on two dissimilar (but good) turntables.....allows for a really good evaluation of arm and cartridge differences.

But the salient message that both Manitunc and Nandric posit.....is that the aural memory is simply not good enough to retain the really subtle minutiae of these differences over a time delay of even an hour?
Most of us think we do retain this expertise yet those who have multiple arms and cartridges will be the first to admit that we really don't?

Dear Lew,

"The rain in Spain stays mainly on the plain".

Which is why I don't think I can go back to one turntable, even though I was satisfied with one turntable all my life until 4-5 years ago. You may as well ask Casanova why he needed so many women.

I think he's got it?...I really think he's got it!

Dear Lew,

As this Thread is about turntables, arms and cartridges......pretty much anything analogue is relevant :-)

What great news about your procurement of the TT-101 Clock ICs.
Perhaps your tenacity will allow you to be the saviour of many of the 'non-working' TT-101s in existence?
Can't wait for the progress reports?

Nandric,
Maybe you can change a cartridge and be ready to listen in 5 or 6 minutes, but I can't. Just taking off and putting on a cartridge takes me more time than that, without setting VTF and alignment. I mean, without your settings being perfect, there isnt much point in comparing. And then you have to actually listen for a while. For me, unless there is a great difference in the sound between the two, it takes me a while to hear the differences, especially when you are dealing with cartridges in the over $1000 range. It is the subtleties that I am listening for, not huge disparities between cartridges.

Manitunc& Halcro, The obvious and precarious question related to our 'sound memory' is : if one can't hear the difference after, say, one hour , why bother? Anyway one can reach huge savings if this argument is, uh, sound.

Hi Halco,

"However it's still a little tricky to follow the system to get them on this Forum?
I've been trying to teach Thuchan for 3 years now.....but even he has given up? :-)"

THREE YEARS, I might be dead by then!

Regards,
Don

To all,

Thanks to my friend and comrade Nikola, I am now a 3 table owner. Actually the 2nd table is to be "put down in the the basement" as my comrade suggested. It is the UA-7045 arm and a TT-81 table. Let the party begin!

Don, If you are like me, you owe your lust for a Victor turntable to Halcro. At least I do. I recently bought a QL10 (TT101 in plinth cum UA7045 tonearm). It was initially not working, and I bought it in full knowledge that it was "broken", but today in the hands of Bill Thalmann, it works!!! Neither Bill nor I know why.

I think I am going to try the plinth-minimus approach with this one. It is well suited for that.

nandric,
hearing a difference is not the same as making qualitive observations. Of course, gross differences can be heard, but I am referring to subtle ones. Is there a little more air, a little tighter bass, a little more clarity on the cymbals, a little more forward in the midrange. That is a lot easier to determine in 5 seconds between switching inputs, not so much after an hour, and the loss of concentration while changing and aligning a cartridge. If you can, more power to you. I can't. Not with any certainty anyway.

Dear Manitunc, 'Hearing a difference is not the same as making qualitative observations'? What purpose than have the carts comparisons? I don't believe that there are quantitative comparisons of any kind involved. Except the price difference of course. My experience is that an exceptional cart is immediately perceived but because there are also other 'exceptional carts' we want to know which one is better. There is no other way to decide then to compare them. Well your method with two identical tonearms and other 'identical' conditions is of course the best thinkable. But others my prefer to own two different tonearms. I think that both choices are, uh, 'legitimate'. Besides there are no certainties in our hobby as there are none in science.

Hi Lewm,

Before I made the TT purchase, both I and Nikola tried to contact you. We must have the wrong or you have change you email address. It was thought that perhaps you had a Denon TT you might be willing to part with. Neither of us got a reply so we both felt perhaps you were not interested. Your above rely makes me wonder if you ever got our messages?

Regards,
Don