Turntable Reviews

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Analog Corner #207: Wave Kinetics NVS Reference turntable & Durand Telos tonearm

The late Jonathan Tinn of Blue Light Audio, importer of darTZeel electronics and a partner in Playback Designs with DSD expert Andreas Koch, loved vinyl. He approached Wave Kinetics' Matt Schuster and proposed that they together produce a turntable. Matt Schuster came up with the Wave Kinetics NVS Reference turntable ($45,000).

Analog Corner #208: Spiral Groove SG1.1 turntable & Centroid tonearm

Allen Perkins's Spiral Groove SG1.1 turntable ($25,000) is a remarkably dense, compact, belt-driven design that weighs a surprising 75lb. With the motor isolated inside its 18.5" wide by 15" deep plinth, the SG1.1 has a small footprint, and its height of ca 5", including feet, permits a flexibility of placement seldom found with premium-priced turntables.

Technics SL-50C record player

Every first love leaves a strong impression. Hopefully it's a good one. Those of us who are phonography-positive fondly remember our first good record playing system, the first turntable-cartridge combo that let the music turn us on. Maybe it was simple, maybe it was fussy, maybe it was unreliable—no matter, it had that special ability to bring the excitement, beauty, and humanity out of the vinyl grooves, through our audio systems, and into our souls.

Analog Corner #213: the TechDAS Air Force One turntable

In vinyl's heyday, Roy Matthews ran EMI's record-pressing plant in Hayes, Middlesex, in the UK. He even had a hand in designing and building new presses for the company. But when EMI shut down their plant and scrapped most of their presses, Matthews retired. I thought of Matthews when, at the 2013 CES, I spoke with the chief designer of TechDAS's Air Force One turntable, Hideaki Nishikawa.
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