Has vinyl playback technology gone about as far as it can go?

[StereoNET]

This was shot at the Munich High End and a good watch.

 

Quote

Turntable experts Michael Fremer (trackingAngle.com & the absolute sound), Craig Milnes (Director of Design and Engineering Wilson-Benesch), Leif Johannsen (Chief Officer Acoustics and Research, Ortofon), Mark Dohmann (Director Technical Services and Design at Dohmann Audio Pty Ltd) and J.R. Boisclair (Owner WAM Engineering / WallyTools ) in a live discussion about vinyl playback technology and about the possibilities to get the perfect sound out of it. Experience more about actual developments and expert know how in this round

[Grant Slack]

Thanks Marc, this topic raises some questions.

 

How much lower is the distortion of the best cartridges today compared to 1980?

 

How much flatter is their frequency response?

 

How much better is their tracking?

 

How much lower is tracking error today compared to 1980, when numerous linear tracking arms were available?

 

I suspect that some of the answers would be in the negative, were it even possible to collate data to answer them, given the near-ubiquitous absence of genuine performance measurements from the manufacturers.

 

I would love to see an unbiased, carefully controlled DBT listening trial of a top 1980 TT setup against Fremer’s six-figure TT, including preference ratings. Never going to happen, but my money would be on no significant preference for the last 45 years of progress.

 

cheers

Grant

[cafe latte]

8 hours ago, Grant Slack said:

Thanks Marc, this topic raises some questions.

 

How much lower is the distortion of the best cartridges today compared to 1980?

 

How much flatter is their frequency response?

 

How much better is their tracking?

 

How much lower is tracking error today compared to 1980, when numerous linear tracking arms were available?

 

I suspect that some of the answers would be in the negative, were it even possible to collate data to answer them, given the near-ubiquitous absence of genuine performance measurements from the manufacturers.

 

I would love to see an unbiased, carefully controlled DBT listening trial of a top 1980 TT setup against Fremer’s six-figure TT, including preference ratings. Never going to happen, but my money would be on no significant preference for the last 45 years of progress.

 

cheers

Grant

Dont be too sure Grant.

Marks turntable for example has technology to get rid of vibrations that did not exist 45 years ago.

Then look at cartridges, we have carts to name one the art 1000 with air coils at the tip and its suspension is sublime. Look at the art 20, the coils are two light bards in a very light plastic former, the rear has a bulge which allows the coils to move easily making for a very fast sound.

45 years ago there were some great turntable and cartridges, but we have definatly moved on. The only place we have not moved forward is the hollow boron cantilevers of old, but hollow thick walls were not much lighter than solid thinner, you just gain a tiny amount of stiffness, apart this we have moved on a long way for sure.

Chris

[aussievintage]

Man I found that hard to watch.  Not sure why.  I suspect they were trying to dumb the science down, but the experts really seemed to struggle to put it across.    Maybe it just should have been about a third as long as it was.

 

Some interesting stuff, despite what I just said, so thanks for posting it Marc.

[Guest]

Mark D alone could fill hours of talking once he gets going  It was in front of an audience, obviously, and so yes I imagine the delivery was aimed at consumers in the crowd. Whereas if you took them into a studio and asked the hard questions, I imagine with that expertise you could really dig in.

 

Some more from Mark (more casual) below from the SN show in 2023.

 

 

 

[cafe latte]

11 minutes ago, Marc said:

Mark D alone could fill hours of talking once he gets going  It was in front of an audience, obviously, and so yes I imagine the delivery was aimed at consumers in the crowd. Whereas if you took them into a studio and asked the hard questions, I imagine with that expertise you could really dig in.

 

Some more from Mark (more casual) below from the SN show in 2023.

 

 

 

Mark apart being a very clever man, he is also an amazing person.

We have chatted for hours about turntables, cartridges and all related. What I like about Mark apart him as a person is he looks at the problem, then he goes back to basics. He takes the problems apart one by one and then sees how to address each one even if it needs space age technology. It is why i sturntables are so good.

Chris

[aussievintage]

14 minutes ago, Marc said:

Whereas if you took them into a studio and asked the hard questions, I imagine with that expertise you could really dig in.

 

I assume so.  Their success means you have to grant them that assumption at the very least  .

 

2 minutes ago, cafe latte said:

What I like about Mark apart him as a person is he looks at the problem, then he goes back to basics. He takes the problems apart one by one and then sees how to address each one even if it needs space age technology.

 

I noted how they readily went looking for science and expertise from outside (like from Uni experts).  So refreshing compared to the black art mystical approach in which a lot of hifi marketing and "development" seems to indulge.

[cafe latte]

1 minute ago, aussievintage said:

 

I assume so.  Their success means you have to grant them that assumption at the very least  .

 

 

I noted how they readily went looking for science and expertise from outside (like from Uni experts).  So refreshing compared to the black art mystical approach in which a lot of hifi marketing and "development" seems to indulge.

Yes this is Mark 100% He takes a problem and then goes off and talks to real experts to work out how to mitigate it.

It is the only way to develop a product, and it is why Mark has been successful. And he is a great bloke too.

Chris

[Guest Moon 600i V2]

On 30/05/2024 at 3:55 AM, aussievintage said:

Man I found that hard to watch.  Not sure why.  I suspect they were trying to dumb the science down, but the experts really seemed to struggle to put it across.    Maybe it just should have been about a third as long as it was.

 

Some interesting stuff, despite what I just said, so thanks for posting it Marc.

When you start to talk about getting the nano information off an LP you lose me. When all records are the same weight, formulation , speed and side program length then we can start to make universal setups possible and there will still be advances to be made. I feel lucky that I live now when I can reasonably expect decent performance from a medium that I grew up with if I invest the time and, let's face it, money to get me to my happy place. I thought the guy from WallyTools was trying to illuminate problems that are not an issue to the general vinyl enthusiast and probably irrelevant. I look at this as a hobby not a lab experiment.

Edited June 22, 2024 by Moon 600i V2

[cafe latte]

1 hour ago, Moon 600i V2 said:

When you start to talk about getting the nano information off an LP you lose me. When all records are the same weight, formulation , speed and side program length then we can start to make universal setups possible and there will still be advances to be made. I feel lucky that I live now when I can reasonably expect decent performance from a medium that I grew up with if I invest the time and, let's face it, money to get me to my happy place. I thought the guy from WallyTools was trying to illuminate problems that are not an issue to the general vinyl enthusiast and probably irrelevant. I look at this as a hobby not a lab experiment.

There is two ways to approach any hobby, take cars as a hobby, some enjoy fixing up old leaky land Rovers, others enjoy Lamborghini and Ferrari and alike with ultimate technology and performance. Both approach are valid.

My own approach to this hobby is sort of both, I have fours SP10MK2's a sl1200G at the classic end a couple of vintage Commonwealth's a lenco too and on the table being fixed for fun is a Dual 1229. I am a bit the same too with cars, on the drive is a last of the real land rovers, Defender, a Dodge Ram and a Porsche. They are are cool in different ways.

Chris

[e83cc]

Quote

45 years ago there were some great turntable and cartridges, but we have definatly moved on.

Really - my go to for the past 30 years is my venerable Dynavector Karat Nova 13D - 1.3mm long diamond cantilever, much flatter and more transparent than most of the top cartridges today. Dynavector have kindly rebuilt it for me several times. Then of course from the same era ( 80's ) the Sony XL88D ( cantilever and tip cut from a single diamond ) was superb along with bespoke Final Audio MC's ( cantilever and tip cut from a single 1 carat diamond, another level up from the XL88D ) ( I own their TT which is another story ), custom built by Yoshihisa Mori of Sony Soundtech, designer of the XL88D.

Only current cartridge I've heard that I would go to would be the Van Den Hul Grand Cru - but they are bespoke.

Then of course there is the Technics EPC100 series vapour deposited hollow cantilevers, flat to oblivion.

There are of course other bespoke cartridges that no-one in the audio world is generally aware of - one such producer I know of in Europe back on the day had a range up to $50000 EURO apiece ( and a waiting period of 18 months due to demand ). You don't read about these in audio mags.

 

 

 

Quote

Then look at cartridges, we have carts to name one the art 1000 with air coils at the tip and its suspension is sublime. Look at the art 20, the coils are two light bards in a very light plastic former, the rear has a bulge which allows the coils to move easily making for a very fast sound.

 

Yeah but I'm also running Ikeda 9's from the 80's - no cantilever slewing around, the coils sit on a hoop right next to the diamond, the AT1000, with those coils waving around on the end of a cantilever, sounds like somebodies been at the pub too long and slurring their words by comparison.

 

I think the big gain in cartridges today is really the quality improvements at lower prices. 

 

Funnily enough I have some NOS MC's from the mid 80's that have sapphire cantilevers/microscanner tips that "appear" to have no glue whatsoever - I am shocked by the current crop of high priced MC ( Koetsu stone bodies for example ) that have huge dobs of glue on the end.

 

Tonearms are significantly better than what was available 30 years ago and there have been advances in design for sure.

 

Megabuck TT's - there are some very good decks, obviously there have been significant improvements in speed control capabilities, but there are also a lot of smoke and mirrors monstrosities that can be embarrassed by something like a Rega P10.

At $200k plus, is there really more engineering cost in a TT than in a supercar.

There are many TT's around the $100k mark that are pretty agricultural in their design AND execution.

 

 

[cafe latte]

13 hours ago, e83cc said:

Really - my go to for the past 30 years is my venerable Dynavector Karat Nova 13D - 1.3mm long diamond cantilever, much flatter and more transparent than most of the top cartridges today. Dynavector have kindly rebuilt it for me several times. Then of course from the same era ( 80's ) the Sony XL88D ( cantilever and tip cut from a single diamond ) was superb along with bespoke Final Audio MC's ( cantilever and tip cut from a single 1 carat diamond, another level up from the XL88D ) ( I own their TT which is another story ), custom built by Yoshihisa Mori of Sony Soundtech, designer of the XL88D.

Only current cartridge I've heard that I would go to would be the Van Den Hul Grand Cru - but they are bespoke.

Then of course there is the Technics EPC100 series vapour deposited hollow cantilevers, flat to oblivion.

There are of course other bespoke cartridges that no-one in the audio world is generally aware of - one such producer I know of in Europe back on the day had a range up to $50000 EURO apiece ( and a waiting period of 18 months due to demand ). You don't read about these in audio mags.

 

 

 

 

Yeah but I'm also running Ikeda 9's from the 80's - no cantilever slewing around, the coils sit on a hoop right next to the diamond, the AT1000, with those coils waving around on the end of a cantilever, sounds like somebodies been at the pub too long and slurring their words by comparison.

 

I think the big gain in cartridges today is really the quality improvements at lower prices. 

 

Funnily enough I have some NOS MC's from the mid 80's that have sapphire cantilevers/microscanner tips that "appear" to have no glue whatsoever - I am shocked by the current crop of high priced MC ( Koetsu stone bodies for example ) that have huge dobs of glue on the end.

 

Tonearms are significantly better than what was available 30 years ago and there have been advances in design for sure.

 

Megabuck TT's - there are some very good decks, obviously there have been significant improvements in speed control capabilities, but there are also a lot of smoke and mirrors monstrosities that can be embarrassed by something like a Rega P10.

At $200k plus, is there really more engineering cost in a TT than in a supercar.

There are many TT's around the $100k mark that are pretty agricultural in their design AND execution.

 

 

I have had an ikeda apart, they are very very agricultural and thry need a full rebuild at retipping time. The art 1000 is way way better made, but serious care will be needed cleaning that stylus.

What has happened is due to better and cheaper manufacturing far better quality is available to everyone. Back in the day we had the sp10mk2 and 3 but was very expensive. Today we have the G and the GR which gives most of benefits of the SP10 but at a far lesser price.

A photographer friend told me that the cheap plastic optics ( he called them cornflake packet lenses) that come with your Nikon camera free are actually quite good. He said yes there are far better lenses, but the accuracy of the cheap lenses was better than some hand finished ones of the past. The same applies to hifi, it is a lot cheaper to get good stuff now.

Chris

[Grant Slack]

5 hours ago, cafe latte said:

I have had an ikeda apart, they are very very agricultural and thry need a full rebuild at retipping time. The art 1000 is way way better made, but serious care will be needed cleaning that stylus.

What has happened is due to better and cheaper manufacturing far better quality is available to everyone. Back in the day we had the sp10mk2 and 3 but was very expensive. Today we have the G and the GR which gives most of benefits of the SP10 but at a far lesser price.

A photographer friend told me that the cheap plastic optics ( he called them cornflake packet lenses) that come with your Nikon camera free are actually quite good. He said yes there are far better lenses, but the accuracy of the cheap lenses was better than some hand finished ones of the past. The same applies to hifi, it is a lot cheaper to get good stuff now.

Chris

Thanks Chris.

 

I wonder whether it would be logical of me to extend your conclusions to a secondary conclusion, that older, once-considered-exotic cartridges can be matched or even beaten on sound quality by modern cartridges from non-exotic brands at affordable prices?

 

cheers

Grant

[cafe latte]

1 hour ago, Grant Slack said:

Thanks Chris.

 

I wonder whether it would be logical of me to extend your conclusions to a secondary conclusion, that older, once-considered-exotic cartridges can be matched or even beaten on sound quality by modern cartridges from non-exotic brands at affordable prices?

 

cheers

Grant

Not in all cases of course, but due to modern manufacturing  there are some very decent carts now that are quite cheap for what they are.

Chris

[mkaramazov]

On 25/06/2024 at 3:27 PM, cafe latte said:

Not in all cases of course, but due to modern manufacturing  there are some very decent carts now that are quite cheap for what they are.

Chris

 

It is interesting to get your perspective on this Chris, as I have wondered how far we have come from the so called 'Golden Age' of vinyl - maybe it wasn't as Golden as we might imagine! 

 

I am curious for example how far Audio Technica have improved on the direct coupled design in the ART 1000mc, compared to the old JVC design it draws inspiration from? I have no doubt the AT is an improvement with modern micro engineering,manufacturing techniques,  computer aided design etc. Though it is hard to tell from the reviews etc exactly how the design has been improved. 

 

One area that we haven't seen improvement, you mention above, is in low mass cantilevers. The old boron pipes (used by Technics and Denon) and beryllium pipes (used by Shure and Audio Technica) are long gone, even though these were likely the highest performing cantilevers available. I note further that nobody seems to mention effective tip mass anymore - possibly because there are few modern cartridges that can match the classic ones on this measure (of course, I am not suggesting that effective tip mass determines whether a cartridge sounds good). 

 

It is also worth noting that the development of new stylus profiles appear to have stalled at the micro ridge / line / SAS and perhaps the Ortofon replicant 100 (Gyger?). Relevant to this thread, it could be that we have reached the absolute limit of stylus design; however we might also speculate that the huge R&D cost for further development does not make sense given the relatively small market for high end stylii.

 

I note there are certain approaches to vinyl from the golden age that are no longer with us, that are not necessarily about 'progress' and more to do with 'fashion'. For example, ultra low mass tone arms running very high compliance cartridges with low VTF. There is no reason to assume that this was a 'better' approach to vinyl replay than the higher mass tone arms today; however it seems to be odd that it is almost impossible to experience this sort of set up today, at least with new gear. Recall of course there were lots of reasons why low mass arms and high compliance, low VTF cartridges were considered a good approach, including of course minimising stylus wear. 

[cafe latte]

12 hours ago, mkaramazov said:

 

It is interesting to get your perspective on this Chris, as I have wondered how far we have come from the so called 'Golden Age' of vinyl - maybe it wasn't as Golden as we might imagine! 

 

I am curious for example how far Audio Technica have improved on the direct coupled design in the ART 1000mc, compared to the old JVC design it draws inspiration from? I have no doubt the AT is an improvement with modern micro engineering,manufacturing techniques,  computer aided design etc. Though it is hard to tell from the reviews etc exactly how the design has been improved. 

 

One area that we haven't seen improvement, you mention above, is in low mass cantilevers. The old boron pipes (used by Technics and Denon) and beryllium pipes (used by Shure and Audio Technica) are long gone, even though these were likely the highest performing cantilevers available. I note further that nobody seems to mention effective tip mass anymore - possibly because there are few modern cartridges that can match the classic ones on this measure (of course, I am not suggesting that effective tip mass determines whether a cartridge sounds good). 

 

It is also worth noting that the development of new stylus profiles appear to have stalled at the micro ridge / line / SAS and perhaps the Ortofon replicant 100 (Gyger?). Relevant to this thread, it could be that we have reached the absolute limit of stylus design; however we might also speculate that the huge R&D cost for further development does not make sense given the relatively small market for high end stylii.

 

I note there are certain approaches to vinyl from the golden age that are no longer with us, that are not necessarily about 'progress' and more to do with 'fashion'. For example, ultra low mass tone arms running very high compliance cartridges with low VTF. There is no reason to assume that this was a 'better' approach to vinyl replay than the higher mass tone arms today; however it seems to be odd that it is almost impossible to experience this sort of set up today, at least with new gear. Recall of course there were lots of reasons why low mass arms and high compliance, low VTF cartridges were considered a good approach, including of course minimising stylus wear. 

Stylus wise I feel we have gone as far as we can re profile, but as you said low tip mass seems to be a thing of the past. Some vintage diamons I have seen the shank of the diamond is tiny, we just dont seem to have those tiny diamonds now.

Regarding profile minor radius of 2.5um is really small and going much smaller is not going to aid inner groove tracking and increasing the ridge depth is not going to help as it will bottom out before the ridge wears away. The only improvement I can see is a smaller shank.

Chris

[mkaramazov]

13 minutes ago, cafe latte said:

Stylus wise I feel we have gone as far as we can re profile, but as you said low tip mass seems to be a thing of the past. Some vintage diamons I have seen the shank of the diamond is tiny, we just dont seem to have those tiny diamonds now.

Regarding profile minor radius of 2.5um is really small and going much smaller is not going to aid inner groove tracking and increasing the ridge depth is not going to help as it will bottom out before the ridge wears away. The only improvement I can see is a smaller shank.

Chris

 

Yes, this all makes sense Chris. 

 

I have a first generation microline here - an early 1980s Audio Technica AT36ML moving coil. It has a fine slender beryllium cantilever with microline stylus (see below). The diamond is smaller than anything I have seen in new Audio Technical stylii - smaller than the the VM540ML, and smaller than the diamond on the ART 9 I have here. It is quite a work of art, and you can see that this would likely have a lower tip mass than the modern AT cartridges. Sounds brilliant too - in my view better than my ART 9. 

 

 

[Wimbo]

I rekon Top quality vinyl manufacturing is a big positive for vinyl playback as well. Some of the LP's I have purchased lately are mind blowing compared to the OG's that I have and played with the utmost satisfaction over the decades. E.G. Aqualung, Jailbreak (TL), CSN, Bad Company, Animals, Year of the Cat, (OG and MoFi).