Reason for buying old/classic turntables

Chris Brady took his Teres belt-drive turntable designs to the pinnacle of the industry by word of mouth with very little review assistance. They were that good. But Chris found that he had reached a plateau with belt-drive and that he could only move forward significantly by developing a state of the art direct drive design. His Certus turntable is arguably the best modern turntable currently available. Still there are those who could buy it and choose vintage tables instead. I think the original poster wants to know why.

And I think I know what other vintage table T-bone is seeking.

I have seen a lot of these old decks. IMHO the Garrad 301 and 401 are over priced and over rated. Thorens TD 124 and Lenco heavy platters are the best performing idler wheels that you can easily get. My pick is the Lenco because they outperform the Garrads and the gorgeous Papst motor in the TD 124 is almost impossible to replace. Lencos are superb performers and cheap if you know how to service them. Just bin the stock tonearm. Spares can still be found. The Technics SP 10 MK II is a good deck [be wary of flogged out ex broadcast examples] but I would only pay around $500 for a good one. The Micro Seiki top end turntables are as good as it gets with superb high tech designs and excellent performance and no they don't make em like that anymore. I think the price you quoted is way too high.My pick of modern decks is Acoustic Signature. I think the argument over belt or idler or direct drive is academic. Broadcast decks have used mainly idler and direct drive with the top direct drives made by EMT, Denon and Technics, idlers do generally exhibit more rumble and turntable noise. Finally I think that you are on to it. Old decks have been hyped out of all proportion to their actual performance. The reason most turntable manufacturers go for belt drive is ease of manufacture and continual income streams from replacement belts. A real high quality direct drive is expensive to manufacture and there is no after sales service or upgrade market to exploit.

Thanks to Mikelavigne for the super informative article. I never looked at a turntable like described in the article. Being an analog freak for the longest time, I can say that I have become a Direct Drive supporter. Playing a solo piano piece through a DD table is the easiest way tell the strengths of a DD table.

70/80's DD tables suffer a lot from their cheaply made plinths. Today is year 2008...soon 2009 and we have learnt a lot about damping, isolation, use of specific materials etc vs in the 70's. All the knowledge gathered in the past 30-40 years can easilly transform a good motor unit into a great sounding table.

Thermonicavenger, I have to disagree on why most TT mfrs go for belt drive - it certainly isn't to make it rich selling belts. And when Technics was selling its SP-10Mk2 in 1975 for 250k yen (the average monthly salary for the household head in the top-earning quintile of Japanese households in 1975), they certainly did not care about trying to squeeze out a few extra yen on the aftermarket (though they nicely provided with an upgrade path with the Mk3 a few years later).

Personally, I think most people who make TTs now are smaller shops who are built around working with materials rather than working with the electronics and/or motors, and frankly, I think it is because a lot of people got sucked into the 'smooth sound' of really good high-mass platter belt drives. Heck, I'm still a sucker for it.

The MicroSeiki designs are not terribly high-tech. They are simply very, very well-machined. And I agree, they don't make them like that anymore.

Are the old decks that over-hyped? People will argue that a good new Technics 1200 is better than the old decks any day of the week. Well, most of the tables (from the big mfrs) a rank or two down from the top in the late 70s and early 80s had better torque, AND better inertia moment. Some of the plinths stunk, but some were quite OK (though those decks are among the rarest). And you can get that technology now, with the original arm (which in some cases are really top notch) for not a lot of money. The trickle-down technology was ridiculously good (still is - most of the makers are still present in precision electronics (Technics = Matsushita/Panny, Aurex = Toshiba, Diatone = Mitsubishi Electric, Lo-D = Hitachi, Exclusive = Pioneer, and Kyocera and Sony are, well, Kyocera and Sony)) and as mikelavigne says, with a new phono stage, cart, plinth, etc, these compete with the best out there.

And Macrojack, I would be very surprised if you did... I don't think I've seen more than 2-3 people ever mention it :^)

Dear Chris: +++++ " Reason for buying old/classic turntables " +++++

I think that each one of us have a different answers about. In my case I buy my Micro Seiki because permit to mount four tonearms along is a good performer. My DD units (Denon/Technics ) are units that I own many years ago way back that I knew the belt drive option.

But IMHO if you don't have a very good reason ( other that the old TT's are less expensive/lower prices. ) then I don't see the necessity to buy a vintage TT ( specially BD ones ) because in its different price range levels and quality performance level the today units are really good ( some at the same level of the vintage ones but some others are better that the old ones. ) and have the advantage that you can have not only parts and service/support but a warranty from the dealer/manufacturer.

Now, this is something that I posted in other thread about DDvsBD:

+++++ " IMHO it is not write the last word on TTs: DD, BD or Idler ones, which one is the last word?, very very hard to say because no one is perfect and all of them have its own design advantages and disadvantages too. Of course that the design execution is a critical subject but everything the same it is a very hard and complex " call " for say the least. " +++++

I can think that if " price/money is no object " then my choice will be for today TT's.

Regards and enjoy the music.
Raul.