Mike New platter, Oyaide MJ-12 mat & STB-MS stabiliser arrive at Marco Towers...

[Marco]

All in good time, old chap.

Right now, I have to get my head around what the platter is doing, and also all the mats and combinations of such, using a well-known reference, cartridge-wise.

It'll take around a week to do this properly, as there will be lots of swapping back and forth with everything, including eventually returning to the stock platter with Oyaide mat and matching weight (and copper mat), to see whether any improvements heard with MN platter were real or imagined.

However, I will post my initial (non-conclusive) impressions of the MN platter later!

Marco.

[colinB]

Im curious as to how important the Oyaide stabilizer is with the platter, and if its any better than just using a standard aluminium weight. I would be surprised if it did.

[Marco]

Hi Colin,

That's one of the things I'll be testing. I've already compared the Bruil (I believe aluminium) weight to the Oyaide, using the stock platter with both copper and Oyaide mats, and it was a no-contest, sonically, in favour of the Oyaide.

I suspect that there's something unique in the design and construction of the Oyaide record weight, especially when used in conjunction with its own mat, that is responsible for the way it improves the sonic reproduction of information on records.

The first thing I'm going to do is listen to the effect of the MN platter on its own with the Oyaide record weight, and then I'll remove the Oyaide weight and use the Bruil.

After that, I'll pop the Oyaide mat and record weight on top of the MN platter (obviously resetting VTA, etc, beforehand) and see what effect that has.

It's all interesting stuff!

I'm just about to have a bite to eat, and then testing will begin

Marco.

[colinB]

Interesting. I was reading on sound fountain about the properties of hard concave mats with a TT weight and the improvement of warped records using such a set up. Unlike some vinyl veterans on here im slowly building a collection , some of which are new releases or heavy weight reissues and disturbingly , many are warped. Seems to defeat the object setting up your arm and cart when the thing is bobbing up and down trying to stick to the grooves.
I use a copper clamp , a bit like the Michel one but heavier and it improves things a bit but its not a perfect solution.

[MCRU]

Nice one Marco, waiting with baited breath!

[MartinT]

For my understanding: does the Oyaide take the record directly, i.e. without a further mat? Does that mean our Achromats could already be superceded?

[Marco]

Yes it does. It's either an Achromat or an Oyaide. The Oyaide is effectively the record mat. Various pics of mats and MN platter coming in a mo!

Marco.

[Marco]

MN platter with annealed copper mat on its own in situ:








And in use with the Oyaide record weight:





And with Bruil record weight:





Oyaide mat, copper mat, and some records:





Ubiquitous 'arty' shot of mats:





Initial impressions, sonically, to follow!

Marco.

[Spectral Morn]

Regards D S D L

[Reid Malenfant]

Ubiquitous 'arty' shot of mats:

It still looks like a drilled brake disc to me, albeit a very pretty one