This is kinda old but if it help anyone I remember flicking vinyl for CD due to noise but recently going back to it I got a valve phono and valve preamp and this time those pops and clicks that don’t budge are way less annoying. I read somewhere since that part of what valves do is soften those sounds. Not swearing by that but it’s definitely different now from when I used to connect the tt straight to a receiver.
What vinyl condition problems can you live with?
- Thread starter paulfromcamden
- Start date
I'm either very lucky or not picky enough, I can only count on the fingers of one hand LPs I've bought that I consider bad/unlistenable and that includes all my second hand purchases.
The last one to go back was the Abbey Road 50th rerelease, I went for the QRP(?) release trying to be clever and thinking it might be a notch up from the standard release, it was awful, so noisy even after a couple of wet cleans it made no difference so it went back and I just stick with my 70s repress as it sounds great.
My rules are minimal warping, no jumps/loud clicks, no background surface noise or as little as possible, and no distortion. I do have a few with a little click that only lasts a couple of revolutions etc. but they are minor and considering the rest of the LP is great they don't bother me.
The last one to go back was the Abbey Road 50th rerelease, I went for the QRP(?) release trying to be clever and thinking it might be a notch up from the standard release, it was awful, so noisy even after a couple of wet cleans it made no difference so it went back and I just stick with my 70s repress as it sounds great.
My rules are minimal warping, no jumps/loud clicks, no background surface noise or as little as possible, and no distortion. I do have a few with a little click that only lasts a couple of revolutions etc. but they are minor and considering the rest of the LP is great they don't bother me.
White Zombie
pfm Member
None. Probably the reason I've tried to get into vinyl a few times and always ended up selling my record players.
Tony L
Administrator
I’m pretty picky, but IME vinyl production seems to have improved significantly in the past decade or so from where it was in the dark days of the ‘90s and early 2000s. I got to the stage of stopping buying as so little new stuff even got to an EX/EX by my grading.
I’ve bought a simply absurd amount of new vinyl over the pandemic and only one return due to scratched vinyl (a couple more orders returned due to packaging/shipping failure that resulted in damaged covers). It looks like the stitching/infill pressing issues that plagued heavy vinyl in past decades have largely been sorted out, plus they seem to have learned how to press on all manner of crazy coloured vinyl without obvious sonic impact. I guess one thing that has changed is we are now conditioned to pay a distinctly premium price, a typical album being £20-35 now by the time it is delivered. I’d still argue poly inners should be mandatory though.
I’ve bought a simply absurd amount of new vinyl over the pandemic and only one return due to scratched vinyl (a couple more orders returned due to packaging/shipping failure that resulted in damaged covers). It looks like the stitching/infill pressing issues that plagued heavy vinyl in past decades have largely been sorted out, plus they seem to have learned how to press on all manner of crazy coloured vinyl without obvious sonic impact. I guess one thing that has changed is we are now conditioned to pay a distinctly premium price, a typical album being £20-35 now by the time it is delivered. I’d still argue poly inners should be mandatory though.
kingston12
pfm Member
I agree that things have definitely improved, but it is warping that is the issue for me - seemingly either caused during pressing or storage/distribution.
If it's an album that I really want then I'll usually try three copies and if they are all warped, I'll put it down to a pressing fault and decide from there whether to keep the last copy.
I'm less concerned about warps on cheaper records (as long as they don't affect play), but on more expensive ones like the Blue Note Tone Poets I'm a bit more fussy!
I can't recall the last time I had to return a record for any other fault, but I would definitely do so for anything that affects play.
chartz
If it’s broke fix it!
A few of my recent purchases are not perfectly flat.
I have hundreds of records I bought between 1978 and circa 1988 that are perfectly flat.
The Beatles’ White Album (my most recent buy) has never sounded so good (I gave my numbered anniversary CD’s away) but it’s not perfectly flat. Disappointing.
I have hundreds of records I bought between 1978 and circa 1988 that are perfectly flat.
The Beatles’ White Album (my most recent buy) has never sounded so good (I gave my numbered anniversary CD’s away) but it’s not perfectly flat. Disappointing.
Tony L
Administrator
I think it is a heavy vinyl thing to a large extent and likely happens after the record is removed from the press, before it is sleeved. Again I’ve had a lot of quiet flat vinyl of late, but there was a period several years ago where just about every record I bought had some degree of dishing. My pet hate at the moment is really nasty tight statically-attracted paper inners that can leave scuffs from insertion/removal. It’s a one way process for me as they go straight in a Nagaoka after a wet clean, but sometimes the damage is already done and there are some hairlines or slight bruising. I was horrified to find them even in a Naim label release (the Yaz Ahmed 2xLP, which is a superb album). Unacceptable!
PS The TD-124 with its concentric ribbed platter mat does disguise dish warps to some degree as the centre label area has somewhere to go unlike say a Linn, but even so I’d notice them when doing the initial wet-clean.
irons1965
pfm Member
It was a real pleasure to find the RSD double LP 'Behind The Dykes 2' (Dutch beat/psych comp of obscurities) on Music On Vinyl to be perfect in every way.
Beautiful pressing, dead flat and quiet (as was the first volume), sleeves refreshingly free of any seam splits/creases and the music is by and large sublime.
A word of praise for Banquet Records too - I've no affiliation with the company but the packaging was excellent (and cheaper compared to a lot of others).
They even saw fit to include a pre printed card apologizing for the delay because of COVID....Not necessary imo.
Beautiful pressing, dead flat and quiet (as was the first volume), sleeves refreshingly free of any seam splits/creases and the music is by and large sublime.
A word of praise for Banquet Records too - I've no affiliation with the company but the packaging was excellent (and cheaper compared to a lot of others).
They even saw fit to include a pre printed card apologizing for the delay because of COVID....Not necessary imo.
chartz
If it’s broke fix it!
I could never live with a felt mat, precisely because it makes it impossible to play slightly warped records. I tried Rega and Linn versions. The Rega type is too thick and makes warped records very unstable.
Felt mats tend to be slippery too and sound bad I find. They are unable to couple the record to the platter properly. A mechanical absurdity.
Felt mats tend to be slippery too and sound bad I find. They are unable to couple the record to the platter properly. A mechanical absurdity.
kingston12
pfm Member
Definitely agree about the inners. I use the Nagaoka sleeves as well, but it's still annoying to see what some of the high quality pressings come with.
kingston12
pfm Member
That's good to know about Banquet. They are my local shop, so I always buy in person but I'd like to buy online from them in the future when I move to a different area.
eguth
pfm Member
I'm in sympathy with you.
I stopped buying records a few years back. I have so many LPs- plus a fair number of 45s - that it is simply unrealistic to hope to listen to all of them with anything resembling regularity during this life.
I have some very rare ones- some in appalling condition- every fault mentioned here- plus some extra faults you would be hard pressed to imagine: for good measure. I don't play them often, to protect my MC styus. However if they are rare enough and I think worth listening to I keep them, even treasure them. All cleaned and housed in protective inners and outer p/p sleeves.
I once freaked out a friend by playing him one of these.
My toggle switched passive preamp is a boon when playing records in appalling condition. One rare pressing I have has a piece of the vinyl missing. A stylus killer.
After I go, my entire collection goes to the British Library Listening Service- along with all hi fi equiipment and ancillaries. I just hope they do not ruin anything.
Big Tabs
looking backwards, going forwards
I haven’t stopped acquiring records, and if something isn’t playable it goes in the bin.
I use the same maxim with the records that I sort for Headway brain injury charity.
If something is scratched to heck it goes in the bin. I might save a great condition sleeve if it is a record that turns up frequently.
That saying I have a David Bowie old single that has a crack in it, just waiting to get a frame for it - someone will buy it framed from the shop.
Graham H
pfm Member
Any off centre LP is a non starter for me, with groove wear pretty close. Out they go, even early pressings. I’m very fussy. Been collecting since I was 11, and still only have about 2,000 titles. No filler. Many, many more have passed through my hands. Every title in Nagoaka inner and RCMd since 1988.
In the 90s I was offered at least three LP collections - gratis - all at least a thousand strong, and out of those I kept about half a dozen titles. Selling them helped fund LPs I wanted. The 90s was a great time for contacting distributors and buying up stuff on FMP, Incus, Soul Note, Black Saint, Matchless and other European indie labels that regarded LPs as dead stock when CDs hit their stride. How times have changed.
In the 90s I was offered at least three LP collections - gratis - all at least a thousand strong, and out of those I kept about half a dozen titles. Selling them helped fund LPs I wanted. The 90s was a great time for contacting distributors and buying up stuff on FMP, Incus, Soul Note, Black Saint, Matchless and other European indie labels that regarded LPs as dead stock when CDs hit their stride. How times have changed.
Sonny Beauceron
pfm Member
95% of my records are 50s-70s, 95% of them bought second hand, most of them from Africa and the Caribbean, with as many 7"s as LPs and lots of 10"s. So pristine is v much the exception.
Skips are fine; sticks not so much.
Surface noise is fine so long as it doesn't actually, as the phrase has it, overpower the music. But I can happily listen to a lot of snap, crackle and pop, as long as i can still hear the music.
Tape hiss, on the other hand, I'm much less tolerant of. More than a little I can't stand.
Off centre warbling needs, for me, to be corrected; but of course it can be.
Distortion is a deal-breaker. There's science (that I can't remember) which explains why distortion hurts your ears. The slightest hint of it and I have to lift the needle.
Skips are fine; sticks not so much.
Surface noise is fine so long as it doesn't actually, as the phrase has it, overpower the music. But I can happily listen to a lot of snap, crackle and pop, as long as i can still hear the music.
Tape hiss, on the other hand, I'm much less tolerant of. More than a little I can't stand.
Off centre warbling needs, for me, to be corrected; but of course it can be.
Distortion is a deal-breaker. There's science (that I can't remember) which explains why distortion hurts your ears. The slightest hint of it and I have to lift the needle.
Colonel_Mad
pfm Member
This could be gear related. It used to really annoy me on my Rega decks. Since moving to a Roksan Radius V/Nima tonearm it is no longer a problem on exactly the same discs.