Turntable speed accuracy


There is another thread (about the NVS table) which has a subordinate discussion about turntable speed accuracy and different methods of checking. Some suggest using the Timeline laser, others use a strobe disk.

I assume everyone agrees that speed accuracy is of utmost importance. What is the best way to verify results? What is the most speed-accurate drive method? And is speed accuracy really the most important consideration for proper turntable design or are there some compromises with certain drive types that make others still viable?
peterayer
Ketchup: "You would think that at least one of them was an audiophile today and maybe even posts on an audiophile forum, but I have never seen one of their posts."

There may well be, but I doubt very much they would post on an English speaking forum. Japanese? ...maybe!
Ecir38 - Thanks, you are right. I couldn't see this info on the Sutherland website so I emailed them and they confirmed that the new model puts out 8 flashes per 1.8 seconds. This gives the user eight spots to choose from. I wish they would update their rather cryptic user manual with this info. It still says one flash per rev.

Can anyone name one brand that is not Japanese, not German, and not Swiss origin that made direct-drive turntables in the 70's, 80's, and 90's before the Rockport Sirius III, which was reviewed in Stereophile in 2000? I certainly cannot think of one. So for 3 decades in the USA and UK that were dominated by Linn, there was no manufacturer making DD tables. Are audiophiles really that monogamous? That statistic is frightening, considering the two audio powerhouses in the world did not make a single direct-drive turntable in the heydays of analog!

Click here for some direct-drive history and brands.

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Dear Nikola, Without saying unkind words about his products that have been sold in the US, I just cannot put Lurne' in the pantheon of great tt designers. Perhaps he marketed some tt's exclusively in Europe that were exceptional.

For the past 20 years, the fashion has heavily favored belt-drive, thanks to Ivor Tiefenbrun and the Linn LP12 and complicit audio reviewers. Only a brave man would have introduced a new direct-drive turntable in the 90s and early 21st century, after the technology had been denigrated for so many years. Plus, and we have been over this ad nauseam, it is much more expensive and technologically challenging to build a new sota direct-drive than it is to do a new belt-drive. Now we finally have a few, in the form first of the Rockport Sirius (a real pioneer product, IMO) and then of the GP Monaco, Brinkmanns, NVS, and Teres Certus. But these are all very expensive and therefore rare.

Dover, FWIW, the motor in the SP10 Mk3 is NOT identical to the cutting lathe motor also made by Technics and used by many in the manufacture of LPs. That one has even much more torque than the Mk3 motor. The Mk3 motor and its drive system were explicitly designed for LP playback.
Dear Lew, I know your opinion about Lurne for some time but
Goldmund thought obviously otherwise when they hired him
as a TT designer. I am not sure if he designed the Goldmund
Reference but well that he designed the Studio which is
a DD kind and also the F3 linear arm. The DD motor was not a problem in Europe . He used the Papst motor first and JVC latter. He is still in business btw.As you also know Dual produced two very interesting DD motors but sold many more belt drives. Dual is now back in buseness but they don't produce any DD turntables at present. The reason is probable the pessimistic market expectation.
However I also mentioned Kuzma, Driessen and Yorke but you
obviously prefered not to comment on them. Considering the
prices for their TT's one can hardly argue that the production cost is the reason for their avoidance of DD kind.

Regards,