[Rednamalas1]

I have VERY little surface noise now (records are well cleaned and I think I do have a decent rig for vinyl - with exception of phono stage) surface noise doesn't bother me at all - but when stax arrives....

 

[Stephen Murphy]

I am sure you are already enjoying some great sound with your current vinyl rig as listed in your sig. The weakest link might be the phono stage. Things would improve greatly if you could upgrade to something (used) with tubes such as an Audio Research or Sonic Frontiers unit. You would hear a nice improvement in dynamics, air, detail, even less surface noise, etc.

I am using Senn 600s and listen mostly to vinyl, and I find them excellent. I tried some AKG 701s but ended up letting them go. I didn't like them with vinyl or digital for that matter. Too analytical and not musical enough for me.

 

[robm321]

Oddly enough the Grado GS-1000 brings out the surface noise like crazy, but it also gels with vinyl and tubes.

The senns 600/650 also do very well and don't expose a lot of the surface noise.

The AKG K701s aren't the greatest with surface noise.

The Grado HP-2 is great at eliminating surface noise of LPs.

All the Stax I've heard with vinyl has a bit of an edge with and crackles similar to the GS-1000.

 

[jivetrain]

i agree that you should clean your records first and foremost before doing anything else if you want to reduce surface noise, and i don't mean by washing them in the sink. you need a vacuum machine in order to get the dirt out of the grooves and off the record, otherwise you're just pushing the dust on the surface around. i tried to avoid buying one as long as i could, but to be honest it was a waste of time. nothing works but the vacuuming, and so long as the record hasn't been abused badly, it does work.

the cheapest ones will run you a few hundred, but if surface noise is this much of a problem for you then it should be a worthwhile expense. i honestly don't know how one pair of headphones could possibly reduce the amount of static you hear while allowing the music to come through unchanged, you're trying to reduce the noise from the exact opposite end of the signal chain. start with the record itself, then make sure you have a good clean stylus, tonearm, table, ect. work from the source out

 

[Rednamalas1]

Quote:

Originally Posted by jivetrain /img/forum/go_quote.gif i agree that you should clean your records first and foremost before doing anything else if you want to reduce surface noise, and i don't mean by washing them in the sink. you need a vacuum machine in order to get the dirt out of the grooves and off the record, otherwise you're just pushing the dust on the surface around. i tried to avoid buying one as long as i could, but to be honest it was a waste of time. nothing works but the vacuuming, and so long as the record hasn't been abused badly, it does work. the cheapest ones will run you a few hundred, but if surface noise is this much of a problem for you then it should be a worthwhile expense. i honestly don't know how one pair of headphones could possibly reduce the amount of static you hear while allowing the music to come through unchanged, you're trying to reduce the noise from the exact opposite end of the signal chain. start with the record itself, then make sure you have a good clean stylus, tonearm, table, ect. work from the source out

I'm on that already- I will borrow VPI record cleaner from my gf's dad when I do need to clean records - and I do wash them in the sink - all of my records are in good shape at the moment after obnoxious cleaning

I noticed some headphones have more pronounced surface noise (that I've recently sold), compared to other cans - I just wanted to see other people's experiences were the same.

I don't think you've read my earlier posts.

 

[jivetrain]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rednamalas1 /img/forum/go_quote.gif I noticed some headphones have more pronounced surface noise (that I've recently sold), compared to other cans - I just wanted to see other people's experiences were the same. I don't think you've read my earlier posts.

i did, my point was that headphones have no possible bearing on the actual amount of surface noise generated by the turntable whatsoever. their frequency response and the level of detail can determine how pronounced the noise is at the end of the chain, true, but i don't think that's a reasonable way to solve the problem. even if you find a pair of phones that are forgiving for a bad record, the noise is still there and will distort the sound in more ways than just crackles. the overall fidelity is worse, the extension in the far treble and bass seems to be reduced and complex moments will often sound chaotic and harsh on an uncleaned record.

i tried cleaning a few cheap ways and it made no difference until i bought the vacuum machine, and the difference was startling sometimes. passages that had really annoying static became dead silent; the noise wasn't just reduced, it was gone. and again, it's not just about static, the overall sound was clearer and just better all around. i think when you use the VPI machine you'll hear that you don't need special headphones to enjoy your records anymore. i use grado 225's, which are pretty detailed and bright headphones compared to most and i still don't hear any surface noise when listening to my records. you don't have to make any compromises in order to get great sound without crackles.

 

[Rednamalas1]

^ I absoltely agree on that account - I and Dave (who sold me his Gyrodec for very good price) worked to make sure that surface noise doesn't become too overwhelming. I guess my question is more about which headphones are better matches with vinyl rig in general - in that sense.

Some stax are apparently wonderful with vinyl, as well as HD650s, RS1s etc. And I wonder what else is out there. And also to see if other people had bad matches between certain headphones and their vinyl rigs.

 

[sunseeker888]

Grado sr325i's are not the choice if your records are screwed up IMHO.

I have roughly 200-300 LPs and maybe 20 or so have audible noise on the quiet passages. Well, the Grado's reveal every last detail (with any of my sources) Still a good experience however, and tubes do help...

 

[Peter Pinna]

To the OP:
I suggest you find headphones that are not forgiving of surface noise but rather enable you to hear as accurate as possible the sound of the record including it's surface noise. The reason is because, if you want to record the recording and "filter out" the surface noise, your adjustments for the filtering will be more accurate than if you had monitored using headphones that had "built in" filtering / "forgiveness". And, if your purpose is solely listening and not recording, you can customize the filtering (EQ adjustment) to suit your listening preferences exactly. With a "forgiving" headphone, your EQ adjustments suited exactly to your listening preferences would be more difficult to achieve.

 

[Rednamalas1]

^ that's what I've been thinking as well. I guess I'll fiddle with my vinyl rig if it does cause enough annoyance (it hasn't so far)

 

[Skylab]

As long as you are wet-vacuum cleaning your records, which it sounds like you plan to, then I would say you just need to AVOID headphones that are peaky in the treble or upper mids. So I would avoid Grados. Sennheisers would be a better choice. I also love my Darth Beyers and JVC DX1000's with my Vinyl rig. You have an excellent Vinyl rig there (although I would go with a nice tube phono stage

)

One quick thing - there is NO COMPARISON to using a wet-vacuum record cleaning machine versus any other cleaning method. Wet-vacuum cleaning will make new records completely silent and clean up used records to very close to that - you have to hear it to understand how profound the difference is. NO washing comes even close to wet-vacuum cleaning.

 

[moogoob]

In my rig... the cheapest headphones I can find.

In my case, it's:
Old/scratched records-->late 70s Technics turntable-->stock tonearm, inexpensive cartridge-->Early 90s Technics receiver-->Tape/DAT out to no-name RCA-mini cable-->Headroom Micro-->Grado SR80s

That's my budget vinyl setup/Frankenstein's monster

 

[Rednamalas1]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Skylab /img/forum/go_quote.gif As long as you are wet-vacuum cleaning your records, which it sounds like you plan to, then I would say you just need to AVOID headphones that are peaky in the treble or upper mids. So I would avoid Grados. Sennheisers would be a better choice. I also love my Darth Beyers and JVC DX1000's with my Vinyl rig. You have an excellent Vinyl rig there (although I would go with a nice tube phono stage )

Yup Phono stage upgrades are coming soon - but will be after electrostats though. I heard wonderful things about RS1s mated to tubes though?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Skylab /img/forum/go_quote.gif One quick thing - there is NO COMPARISON to using a wet-vacuum record cleaning machine versus any other cleaning method. Wet-vacuum cleaning will make new records completely silent and clean up used records to very close to that - you have to hear it to understand how profound the difference is. NO washing comes even close to wet-vacuum cleaning.

Already on it