Epping TT Bake off (from pfm)

[i_should_coco]

Marco has asked me to post a review of the bake off at Richard's so here's my thoughts:



A very interesting day!

Firstly, a big thanks to Richard for hosting and allowing us to take over his lounge. Also to Steve, for helping me lug my 8-box vinyl solution around! Also great to meet everyone face to face.

Richard's system is very different to the one I use at home, and so initially some time was spent getting accustomed to the sound of the various decks and playing some tracks on the various decks.

I have to say that I rather enjoyed the LP12! It was arguably hampered somewhat by sitting directly on the floor, but then again, perhaps not, as it certainly wasn't bad! It definitely has a rich character and it does tend to portray music the way *it* wants to, but always enjoyable nonetheless. It was really when the Eagle-Eye Cherry track got busy that it started to show limitations.

The Garrard was a rather unconventional implementation, going aganst the grain of accepted wisdom in many ways. Sitting in a Torlyte plinth and with a Rega arm playing host to a Denon DL-103, the Garrard was incredibly dynamic and resolved the dynamic contrasts in a much better fashion than the Linn, which seems to compress things. Having said that, whilst very enjoyable, the DL-103 is rather crude, however and this was most clear because it was followed by the Io Ltd.

I have to admit, I was a little disappointed with how the SP10/Io Ltd. sounded on the day. Initially plugging it in to Richard's MM phono stage resulted in a large amount of hiss. Richard believes that there is some fault with that one, so we tried it directly into his MC stage bypassing the transformer. This resulted in almost no sound, so we reverted back to my own valve-based stage. I later discovered that I hadn't switched the cartridge on (doh!). We tried again with Richard's MC stage using the step-up as a 1:10, rather than a 1:100 ratio. While this sounded ok, and pretty refined (partly because it tended to follow the DL-103 when playing tracks), I felt it was rather too polite sounding. I would agree with Richard that SP10s can be a bit colourless and I make up for that at home with colourful speakers.

The PL71/SPU combo had a lot in common with the SP10, but sounding less polite. I thnk that this is a great deck and an absolute steal at the prices they are going for. I've have always had a soft spot for SPUs - wonderfully musical things that they are. I also had another bite at the PL71 cherry at Steve's house on the way home. This is in a much more similar system to my own (Tannoys driven by valves), and it confirmed that it's an excellent deck.

So, no winners or losers, just lots of different sounds and especially for me, highlighting how important and elusive system synergy is.

[Marco]

Hi Pete,

Marco has asked me to post a review of the bake off at Richard's so here's my thoughts:

Cheers for that, matey!

Richard's system is very different to the one I use at home, and so initially some time was spent getting accustomed to the sound of the various decks...

Could you expand on this a little? I'm curious how someone like you who (like me) is attuned to valves & big old Tannoys would perceive the sonic signature/way of music-making of a system like Richard's

I have to say that I rather enjoyed the LP12! It was arguably hampered somewhat by sitting directly on the floor, but then again, perhaps not, as it certainly wasn't bad!

I'm not really surprised, TBH. The chap who owned the LP12 obviously knew what he was doing, with all the parts forming a synergistic match, sonically. I also enjoy listening to good LP12s - they are undoubtedly enjoyable to listen to - but at the same time I'd have to say that they're one of the most coloured sounding T/Ts I've heard. I'd qualify that though by adding 'coloured' in a nicely euphonic way.

The Garrard was a rather unconventional implementation, going aganst the grain of accepted wisdom in many ways. Sitting in a Torlyte plinth and with a Rega arm playing host to a Denon DL-103, the Garrard was incredibly dynamic and resolved the dynamic contrasts in a much better fashion than the Linn, which seems to compress things. Having said that, whilst very enjoyable, the DL-103 is rather crude, however and this was most clear because it was followed by the Io Ltd.

I can indeed imagine a stock DL-103 (I presume that's what it was?) sounding rather crude next to your Io Ltd, but it's interesting to note that you still found the 103 very enjoyable all the same. Even in stock form, it gets the basics of music reproduction right and has a 'fun factor' that in my experience often eludes many high-end MC cartridges, which major instead on 'accuracy' and absolute detail retrieval, but often sound very 'cool' and soulless with it.

I'm also rather shocked to read that a DL-103 sounded great in a Rega arm, albeit a heavily modified one. Did you happen to ask the chap exactly how the Rega was modified? That would be interesting. I also looked closely at the picture and couldn't see if any extra mass had been added to the headshell. It appeared not, but the picture wasn't great. Can you confirm?

I have to admit, I was a little disappointed with how the SP10/Io Ltd. sounded on the day. Initially plugging it in to Richard's MM phono stage resulted in a large amount of hiss. Richard believes that there is some fault with that one, so we tried it directly into his MC stage bypassing the transformer. This resulted in almost no sound, so we reverted back to my own valve-based stage. I later discovered that I hadn't switched the cartridge on (doh!). We tried again with Richard's MC stage using the step-up as a 1:10, rather than a 1:100 ratio. While this sounded ok, and pretty refined (partly because it tended to follow the DL-103 when playing tracks), I felt it was rather too polite sounding. I would agree with Richard that SP10s can be a bit colourless and I make up for that at home with colourful speakers.

A couple of points here... Again system synergy (as you've mentioned) comes to the fore, so I'm not surprised that a highly tuned device such as your IO Ltd didn't perform at its best in an 'alien' system. Could you expand on the sonic and musical differences you perceived with the Io between using it with your SUT and Richard's MC stage? I'd like to get a better handle on what happened there exactly.

With reference to the SP10, I know what you mean by "colourless", but I don't in any way see this as a negative - far from it. For me, SP10s and modified SL1200/1210s simply tell it as it is on the record, as the arm and cartridge interpret it. The motor units themselves are intrinsically accurate devices. 'Colour' comes from the music itself recorded on the record, not the signature imposed by the turntable - and that's exactly how it should be, unless you wish to tailor the sound in some way to suit your specific preferences (a la LP12, etc).

The other thing I'd like to pick up on is the fact that you consider your Tannoys as "colourful". I can't really comment on yours, as I've only heard them once at Scalford Hall (where I enjoyed them), but I've got to say that the Lockwoods, with 15" Monitor Reds, are undoubtedly the least coloured sounding speakers I've ever used or heard. Remind me of what drive units and cabinets you're using again?

The Lockwood Majors I have here are über-revealing but very musical with it, and to my ears appear to have very little character of their own. Maybe it's different because they are genuine monitor desings or because the cabinets we use are different, or perhaps the drive units or crossovers? I don't know, but I struggle to understand where you get this 'colour' from that you mention...

Personally, I wouldn't entertain using speakers that are coloured, as you have asserted, because it goes against my system-building principles, so we must be hearing very different things with our respective 'big old Tannoys'

The PL71/SPU combo had a lot in common with the SP10, but sounding less polite. I thnk that this is a great deck and an absolute steal at the prices they are going for. I've have always had a soft spot for SPUs - wonderfully musical things that they are. I also had another bite at the PL71 cherry at Steve's house on the way home. This is in a much more similar system to my own (Tannoys driven by valves), and it confirmed that it's an excellent deck.

I've got no doubt that it is. Quite simply, there are too many people whose ears I 'trust' reporting on how good it is. Obviously I'll have to hear one myself to come to a proper conclusion, but I've read enough from people who know what a good sound is to understand that the PL-71 is up there with what I would call 'real turntables', such as the SP10, modded Techy, Denons, Garrards, EMTs and Lencos.

I also love the SPU because it's so dammed addictive and musical sounding, and again possesses that all-important 'flavour' and 'tone', which I've mentioned elsewhere and consider as vital to realistic music reproduction. I will definitely add an SPU to my cartridge collection sooner rather than later.

So, no winners or losers, just lots of different sounds and especially for me, highlighting how important and elusive system synergy is.

I can't stress how important that latter bit is. It is, quite simply, what 95% of building a hi-fi system is all about!

Glad you had a good time, Pete, and thanks for the write-up. I look forward to reading your thoughts on the points that I've raised

Marco.

[WikiBoy]

I think you need to understand the difference between coloured and colourfull!

[Marco]

Explain it to me then, as you see it. "Colourful", by definition, implies a form of 'coloration' or 'character'.

I wouldn't describe the Tannoys I'm using currently as being "coloured" or "colourful" - they simply allow the music through as convincingly and as naturally as possible. Of course, every loudspeaker is coloured to some degree, but that's definitely not the first word that would pop into my head when describing my Lockwoods.

They're very much like the SP10, in that respect, in that they only sound "colourful" when the music or recording itself possesses that trait.

Marco.

[WikiBoy]

Sigh!

Coloured means it adds different colour.

Colourful means it excentuates the colour that is there.

[Marco]

I understand how you interpret it. It's still not a word I'd use in that context. Would you describe the SP10 as "colourful"?

Marco.

[WikiBoy]

I understand how you interpret it. It's still not a word I'd use in that context. Would you describe the SP10 as "colourful"?

Marco.

Io ltd - yes

SP10 - no

[Marco]

Ok, we'll leave it there

I'm interested now in what Pete has to say

Marco.

[i_should_coco]

Hi Marco,

Richard's system is simply different to mine an follows a different philosophy, emphasising speed and presence whereas A valve/Tannoy system goes about things in a different fashion. I don't really want to get into the minutiae of differences because it all depends on you reference point. One man's 'coloured' is another man's 'depth of tone' and so on.

Regarding Tannoy colourations - yours may be different, as they're in different cabinets, but Tannoys aren't exactly renowned for being neutral. I'm under no illusions that they're uncoloured and I love them despite this (partly that is the flimsy GRF cabinet joining in) because they're colourful and in conjunction with valves bring a life to the music that I value. It's quite possibly distortion, but who cares when they sound this enjoyable. But they're not for everyone.

I've had people visit and upon initial listening, they wrinkle their nose and start pointing out that they're a bit coloured and this and then, then over a period of about 10 minutes they trail off, get accustomed to the colouration and enjoy the music.

On the DL-103 - Jim's Garrard was in a Torlyte (lightweight) plinth, which goes against the 'mass is right' principle which has been the conventional way of doing things with Garrards. From what I hear, the Rega arm is not normally a good match with the DL-103 due to the low mass and high rigidity, but this one had a tension bolt running up the middle which would certainly add mass. Perhaps this, coupled with the lightweight plinth allowed the energy fed into the arm by the low compliance cart to be effectively managed. Whatever the reason, it did show dynamic contracts extremely well, it's just that it was rather raucous with it. In the listening tests, it nearly always followed the LP12/Zyx, which tends to compress things and so the comparison tends to magnify this. As the SP10/Io nearly always followed it, it highlighted the crudeness. The Io should have been even better in terms of dynamics, but more on that later). Anyway, it definitely has it's attractions as it brings life to the music after the compression of the Linn.

On the Io/Step-ups - when we initially tried Richard's MM stage, it hissed badly, indicating some kind of problem, so we reverted back to using the MC stage and plugged it in directly which resulted in a very, very quiet sound. As it turned out, I'd forgotten to switch on the magnet. In the meantime, I set my phono stage up and we used that for the initial listening with the Kondo step-up. It was a little bright for my tastes, TBH, probably because I run a 47kOhm load which leaves the MC rising response intact. With the Tannoys, this balances the roll-off over 10kHz (I've measured it, and they definitely do). Really, the Io should see about 12k through the transformer.

In the interests of keeping things consistent, we switched to Richard's MC stage and used the SF-Z set to a 1:10 ratio, rather than 1:100 and this gave a very different sound. Rather too polite for my tastes and constrained dynamics (normally this is one of it's party pieces). I tried using the intermediate ratio, but that didn't work so well. Ultimately, I cam back to my phono stage at the end and I was personally a bit happier, except for the brightness).

On the SP10 - I've already in the past identified a slight 'greyness' in the midband with the SP10. In a similar way that I hear the differences between valves and transistors. It's a sin of omission - and not in the sense of lacking colouration, but lacking slightly in tonal colour and richness, a slight coolness if you will. As I have identified it myself, I feel it's a fair criticism. That's why I use such a colourful cartridge and speakers. In an ideal world, we'd have the perfect stereo. Even despite this, I doubt I'd change it for anything else, at least not anything I can afford.

As you know, I value tone and colour, so have built my system around that principle. Of course, transplanting bits into another system is going to have it's issues, but despite that, it was an interesting exercise and we learned a lot.

[Steve Toy]

I am no fruitbox fan but the dynamics would be seriously sat on if the deck was plonked on the floor. This deck responds [dynamically] to to being properly supported. The comparison was perhaps inconclusive for this reason.