[insomniac]

To all the vinyl gurus out there... After resisting a long time, I'm now seriously considering giving vinyl a go. I pretty much know absolutely nothing about it other than there are records involved. After some cursory research, I've narrowed down my turntable choices to the Rega P1, Pro-Ject Debut III and Music Hall MMF-2.1. Is there anything else in this general price range I should be considering?

What do I need? I don't know what tone arms or cartridges are yet but I know I need them and I think they are included with the turntables listed above. Then there's the phono stage, whatever that is. What are some recommended models appropriate for the above turntables?

Is there anything else I need?

I don't mind going up in price range but I don't want to invest too much into this just yet. Just want a taste of the whole vinyl experience and if it suits me, I can always upgrade later.

Thanks!

 

[Zuerst]

http://www.head-fi.org/forums/showthread.php?t=225660

 

[Uncle Erik]

I looked at those turntables, too. I think they're all good choices, but don't limit yourself to new ones. There are plenty of good used ones in that price range, too. Ultimately, I went with a used Rega Planar 3. It's a good mid-range deck with (I think) very good performance. I nearly spent a lot more, but am glad I didn't. Another good used deck in this range is the Sota Sapphire. If you're interested in used, check around Audiogon. There's always plenty for sale.

You will need a phono stage if you're not using an preamp/amp with one built in. Most vintage units from the 60s/70s will have one built in. Anything made post-CD probably doesn't. There are many to choose from, but I went with the NAD PP2. They run around $130 and do a good job. If you're interested in DIY, there are a lot of plans out there, as well. I'm working on a tube one... hopefully I'll be able to hack on it some this weekend.

The phono stage adds the RIAA (yes, that one) equalization curve to the playback. There's a long, technical description of what it does, but in a nutshell, record engineers have to steeply attenuate the low end on records. If the groove was wide enough to accomodate low frequencies, it'd be too wide for the stylus. It'd fall into the groove and you'd lose the high end. Either that, or you'd have to use a big stylus, and that would introduce a lot of problems, too. Instead, a phono preamp adds the low frequencies back in.

Before I took the vinyl plunge, I did a lot of reading. By far, the most influential reading I found is this:

http://www.furious.com/perfect/vinylanachronist.html

There are a lot of articles there, but I read all of them. They're entertaining and well-written, so it's worth your time to read them. You'll learn a lot and will have a better idea of where to go with a vinyl rig.