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Cart Vs Arm/TT

matt j

pfm Member
I know there are plenty of folk who think a 50p cart on a 5k deck sounds amazing, but what about the other way around?

I've just fitted my ZYX R50 to a Thorens TD150 that looks like it has been in a shed or at the bottom of a canal for a decade, and it sounds about 98% of my very fine LP12 rig. Granted I'm taking the cart and phono stage as one entity here, so all things being equal what is going on?
 
Nothing, all is well.
Now you know how overpriced the good old LP12 has become.

This isn't intended as a slight against the LP12, compared to the TD150 the quality/tolerance is laughable, the 150 feels and looks like something from a student project. I'm going purely on sound quality here.
 
Of course. Thorens decks have always been steadily popular and loved this side of the channel, with few people buying an LP12 when its price sky rocketed.
They are undervalued decks. I have a stock TD160 from 1982 and it still sounds fantastic with modern cartridges!
By the way, I use a Valhalla on my 160, which makes the Swiss motor totally silent.
 
I think my quest now is to find how far I can reduce this without losing any quality.

I'm not convinced I still fully understand vinyl replay as there seems to be too many variables to compare with other people's tastes, music and system, plus a load of bull shit perpetrated over the years from previous decades of magazine/journalist shilling.
 
I think my quest now is to find how far I can reduce this without losing any quality.

I'm not convinced I still fully understand vinyl replay as there seems to be too many variables to compare with other people's tastes, music and system, plus a load of bull shit perpetrated over the years from previous decades of magazine/journalist shilling.


That's it in a nutshell, I'd recommend you try some other designs totally different to the sprung subchassis belt drive type, I had quite a few, Thorens, STD, Michell, Voyd etc, for my personal tastes the NA Hyperspace wiped the floor with all of them, different arms made a difference but all were used with the same variety of cartridges and the same two phonostages.
 
Does the TD150 still have the original (TP13?) arm? People used to replace them with 'better' arms.

Big mistake, the original arm is actually excellent.
 
Does the TD150 still have the original (TP13?) arm? People used to replace them with 'better' arms.

Big mistake, the original arm is actually excellent.

It has the original arm yes, I'm not sure if it is the TP13 or not because I think they had two different arms? I have a Hadcock to go on and try next.

That's it in a nutshell, I'd recommend you try some other designs totally different to the sprung subchassis belt drive type, I had quite a few, Thorens, STD, Michell, Voyd etc, for my personal tastes the NA Hyperspace wiped the floor with all of them, different arms made a difference but all were used with the same variety of cartridges and the same two phonostages.

Yes I've had dozens of TTs now, but I always seem to come back to sprung sub chassis type. So there's obviously something going on that I like. Still not heard an NA though, which is sacrilege I suppose given I live walking distance from their HQ.
 
@matt j I can only tell you my experience, the Hyperspace bettered them all for soundstage width, height, depth combined with a lower noise floor and toe tapping musicality and it didn't matter whether it was AC/DC , Ella Fitzgerald, Depeche Mode or King Curtis and that was with Hadcock tonearm, bit of a coincidence but George Hadcock used a Thorens TD150, he was mightily impressed that it was going to be mounted on a Gyro or Hyperspace, absolute cracking VFM tonearm when set up just spot on with a suitable.MM or MC.
 
I'm a bit confused here but am going on memory. I had a TD 150 in 1966 , bought as a deck (no TP13 then) and stuck a Decca on it. It was the most bouncy bouncy thing to host vinyl, and that was with a Shure tracking at around 1.25g. However, we were young lads in sixties Hampstead at the time. I know they brought out a mark two, but I thought the TP13 arrived when they introduced the TD 125 electronic (I had one pre. '82, but fitted an SME 3009, as word was that the TP13 wasn't the best (magazine word in those days).

Re transition from many sprung and unsprung decks, culminating in the Orbe, I moved to N.A. Dais about 7/8 years ago. Apart from the flexibility of arm length and number, I wouldn't revert on any other grounds either, and that's not just because it's too heavy to move !

I liked my idler 401 in the early seventies (after 2 x Goldring idlers and TD150) but feel that this form of propulsion is (theoretically) flawed.
 
I would have loved a Verdier but couldn't afford one when they were available.

Verdiers are still being made even though Monsieur Verdier passed away about 3 hrs ago. His family have continued the business. Jack at BD Audio has closed now. The previous distributor Graham Tricker at GT Audio could probably source one as he was the UK distributor for over 15 years and probably knows the family well.
 
Verdiers are still being made even though Monsieur Verdier passed away about 3 hrs ago. His family have continued the business. Jack at BD Audio has closed now. The previous distributor Graham Tricker at GT Audio could probably source one as he was the UK distributor for over 15 years and probably knows the family well.

I didn't know that, I had noticed a couple on ebay recently, I'm pretty sure they'd still be out of my price range though.
 
I know there are plenty of folk who think a 50p cart on a 5k deck sounds amazing, but what about the other way around?

I've just fitted my ZYX R50 to a Thorens TD150 that looks like it has been in a shed or at the bottom of a canal for a decade, and it sounds about 98% of my very fine LP12 rig. Granted I'm taking the cart and phono stage as one entity here, so all things being equal what is going on?[/QUOTE]

The law of diminishing returns is going on.

The LP12 is essentially a refined TD150/160 with better build and some sonic tuning.

Remember that audiophiles invariably exaggerate differences, and reviewers most certainly do!
 


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