Hi. I have been trying for quite some time to bring my vinyl soundstage up to snuff with Apple Music’s digital. The hi-res digital consistently convinces you that there is a center channel, and while my turntable sounds great, there is no coherent center image.
While I am certain my TT has always been well calibrated from VTA to VTF to Azimuth to antiskate, I have tinkered with small changes to them all at times and I just can’t nearly replicate the soundstage I get with digital.
Same amplifier for both sources, both playing direct, without any digital eq, because that’s the way I find it sounds best.
More equipment details in my profile, but I’m running a Pioneer PL-550, recently serviced and running dead on rpms. Lounge Audio MKiii phono amp. Belden interconnects, new AT VM95 ML stylus. Fully isolated turntable and preamp that are dead quiet at reasonable volumes.
So anyone have any ideas? Many people rave about their TT soundstage. I want to go to there.
Imaging is the one thing that is the most difficult to attain right - be it in analog or digital.
It entails EVERYTHING ELSE to put nearly right, approaching perfection - before that elusive imaging can really start shining trough it all.
Let's first do digital; it just does not image anything even approaching real live sound unless sampling rate - from the original recording to the actual delivery media, whatever it is, is not at least 88.2 kHz - preferably a lot higher. That's why RBCD sounds - at best - like a life size cardboard images ( of politicians in a voter campaigns ) compared to the real people standing in the same space. This kind of image lacks depth - and RBCD supporters can't do absolutely nothing to disprove the above fact in a direct comparison with a GOOD/EXCELLENT analog - be it record or tape.
Analog is, unfortunately, FAR more complex than the digital in regard of the imaging. Particularly for getting it out of the analog vinyl record. I will have to use the term "record player", as a turntable ( TT in further text ) is only that - rotating disk, which by itself can not reproduce the sound engraved in the grooves of the record that can be put atop this rotating disk aka TT.
That TT should have reasonable ( below audibility ) wow & flutter and rumble. The figures for TTs that do achieve desired values have been met or exceeded roughly half a century ago - and any competently designed TT after say 1970 should fit the bill. That is not to say that present day entry level TTs are not prone to failing to meetr these criteria ... - caveat emptor !
That TT also has to be at least reasonably well isolated from feedback - both structural as well as airborne. This is not ea$$y to attain.
Then one needs a stylus/cartridge - and an arm to carry it over the record revolving on the TT. There are many levels of shape and quality of diamond stylus, cartridge cantilevers, suspensions, operating principles and supporting electronics that finally put out a linear ( near ) line level signal that can be treated the same as output from digital for everything downstream of the entire listening chain.
The arms also encompass a really vast range of types and qualities - and can go from the most basic to the ones that let one adjust each and every parameter known to mankind, the most sophisticated ( and $$$$$$...$$$ ... ) on the fly and even by remote control.
The basic requirements for analog record playback to be decent are:
- lateral geometry
- azimuth
- correct vertical tracking force ( VTF )
- correct antiskating ( if required )
- correct vertical tracking angle ( VTA )
- correct cabling for the cartridge type used
- correct preamplifier input impedance ( both resistance AND - particularly important for MM/MI cartridges - CAPACITANCE ) for the cartridge used.
If all of the above is correctly adjusted using protractors and test records using at least the most basic instrumentation, then there is a chance of attaining a reasonably flat frequency response and reasonably large channel separation - one that is symmetrical in both directions, both in amplitude and phase relative to the driven channel.
Of the above, the most delicate and crucial is the AZIMUTH - because it is so precisely defined and the range of error to either side is not measured in degrees, but - unfortunately - in minutes, if not seconds of an arc. It is impossible to eyeball such tiny errors, that mirror image method so many manufacturers recommend works only IF both the arm and cartridge are perfect. Which, in real world, they almost never are - and that holds true particularly for the cartridges. Only by measurements it is possible to arrive to the best possible adjustment - AND, after one has learned how does a correctly adjusted for azimuth record player sound, on the fly with those rare arms that allow for the PRECISE ENOUGH AZIMUTH ADJUSTMENT ON THE FLY.
Unfortunately, any healthy human being has on a single hand more fingers than there are arms that allow precise enough ( well within than less than 1 degree ) azimuth adjustment on the fly - that is to say during the playback.
Back in the mid/late fifties, a South American mathematician has published a paper in the JAES - establishing the ultimate channel separation stereo record is theorethically capable of. The value was/is 57,xy ( I forgot the last two digits ) dB.
Using real world, but admittedly cherry picked best samples ( < 1% of any given production run ) of MC phono cartridges at Benz Micro Switzerland, where I used to work back in the day, I have been able to obtain channel separation below the inherent noise of the JVC TRS 1007 ( golden standard ) test record at 1 kHz - that is to say about -60 dB, proving the theorethical limit in practice. Best cartridge samples also exceeded 40 dB channel separation - even up to 20 kHz.
The imaging of such cartridges with very flat and EXTENDED frequency response ( " essentially flat " without any mayor aberrations up to at least 40 kHz ) and channel separation described above made mockery of RBCD - and rivaled anything digital with sampling frequency of at least 88.2 kHz and above can offer.
You are using Audio Technica AT VM-95ML - a basic MM cartridge with Micro Line stylus. I have to admit I have yet to test any AT-VM95 cart - but it is spec'd for lower channel separation than the venerable AT-160ML ( and a loooong string of essentially the same cartridge motors/bodies that followed it, culminating in the current VM-540 and VM-740 series.)
I did get approx 40 dB channel separation from a good sample of AT-95E ... - just for another being dud par excellence ( diamond being mounted to the cantilever so far off in azimuth that it would destroy/re-cut any record being played ... ).
AT-VM95 is a MM cartridge - and as such, with frequency response vulnerable to the electric loading. ATs prefer absolutely minimal capacitance in order not to sound bright/thin - the most common complaint regarding AT's MMs. They also like lower input resistance than the nominal 47 kohm - usually in the 33 kohm range.
So, the best that can be done is the total load of the both arm cabling and preamplifier input of 100 pF ( arm cable roughly 80 pF, preamp 20 pF or less ), input resistance 33kohm. These values are EXTREMELY hard to obtain in present day equipment, let alone in present day entry level equipment.
But, without them, it is impossible to get the frequency response from a typical high inductance MM cart as VM-95 series extended enough to obtain the imaging desired.
My suggestion is to get another AT - AT 33PTG II. It is a MC cart, not at the mercy of the imput impedance of the preamp as far as frequency response is concerned - at roughly three times the price of VM-95ML.
But, it is THE best bang for the buck cartridge that is still available. It is better than VM-95ML on each and every count, but requires preamp capable of supporting MC requirements.
Please note that all of the above entails the best stylus tip profile available - or possible - Micro Line, manufactured by Namiki. Any still sharper profile stylus would simply re-cut the groove - so, this is the best stylus tip profile possible, the end of the road. The tracing of Micro Line ( scanning radius of 2.5 micrometers ) supports 40 kHz bandwidth even at the innermost grooves of a 33 1/3 rpm record - and well over 100 kHz at the outside grooves. So, under the worst conditions, can render analog records with about the same resolutiuon as digital with sampling of at least 88.2 kHz.
Any lesser stylus tip profile - the one having scanning radius larger than 2.5 micrometers - ( VdH II/FG II , Shibata, Fine Line ( Stereohedrom, Alliptic , etc ), elliptical, conical )
will be progressively worse towards the inner grooves. Once the stylus dimensions no longer allow the stylus to track the lateral modulation without the pinching, resulting in a vertical modulation not present during the record cutting appears during the reproduction.
This is DISTORTION - and, as vertical modulation is L-R component not present in the original master tape/file, record master or pressed record itself, it gives A FALSE SENSE OF SPACE/IMAGING - WIDER THAN IT SHOULD HAVE BEEN.
One cartridge that enjoys immense following for the last 60 odd years that is giulty of this falsely enlarged imaging is Denon DL-103 - the basic model using the conical stylus. There were/are models of the venerable 103 with better stylus tip profiles and quite a few retipers/remanufacturers who would put a better/decent "sting" on the 103 - of course, at a cost.
