I do not know anything about turntables other than that some need to have a
"pre-amp" before the main amp. I have a nice high-quality turntable here
that I wish to plug into a mixer and play through my Hafler amp. Before I
even attempt this, what type of "pre-amp" might I need? Can I just use a
typical stereo DI or mic pre unit? I know that old consumer amps/receivers
apparently have turntable pres built in... need to recreate this somehow.
Thanks.

"WideGlide" wrote in message et...
I do not know anything about turntables other than that some need
to have a "pre-amp" before the main amp. I have a nice high-quality
turntable here that I wish to plug into a mixer and play through my
Hafler amp. Before I even attempt this, what type of "pre-amp"
might I need? Can I just use a typical stereo DI or mic pre unit?
I know that old consumer amps/receivers apparently have turntable
pres built in... need to recreate this somehow.
Thanks.

You need a "phono preamp" with RIAA equalization built in.

WideGlide wrote in message
et...
I do not know anything about turntables other than that some need to have
a
"pre-amp" before the main amp. I have a nice high-quality turntable here
that I wish to plug into a mixer and play through my Hafler amp. Before I
even attempt this, what type of "pre-amp" might I need? Can I just use a
typical stereo DI or mic pre unit?

No; records were made with a particular EQ curve, boosting the highs and
cutting the lows. After 1955 most companies standardized on the RIAA curve.
You need a preamp that incorporates the inverse of this curve. Also, phono
cartridges (moving magnet ones, at least) are quite persnickety about
loading; they want to see a load of 47k ohms, in parallel with a certain
amount of capacitance (varies with cartridge). Mic pres typically have input
impedances around 2k ohms, which would grossly affect the cartridge's
response.

I know that old consumer amps/receivers
apparently have turntable pres built in... need to recreate this somehow.

The easiest way is to pick up an old consumer amp or receiver, or phono
preamp unit, on e-bay. Plug the unit's tape outputs into your mixer's
line-level inputs.

If you purchased your turntable used, it probably has a cartridge in it that
is either terrible or worn out; a new decent cartridge, say $50 or $100
worth, will provide you with an eye-opening improvement in sound, and won't
chew your records to bits.

Peace,
Paul

WideGlide wrote:
I do not know anything about turntables other than that some need to have a
"pre-amp" before the main amp. I have a nice high-quality turntable here
that I wish to plug into a mixer and play through my Hafler amp. Before I
even attempt this, what type of "pre-amp" might I need? Can I just use a
typical stereo DI or mic pre unit? I know that old consumer amps/receivers
apparently have turntable pres built in... need to recreate this somehow.
Thanks.

No, you need a phono preamp.

You can get a $20 one from Calrad. You can get a $5,000 one from Millennia.
The Millennia one sounds better than the Calrad.

What kind of cartridge are you using?
--scott

--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

Thanks for the info, guys.

I have an Harmon Kardon turntable, about 18 years old maybe... I think it
had cost about $200 - $300 new... it isn't state of the art, but it's
probably better than most low-end consumer units. I bought it back before I
really understood good audio, so at this moment I have no idea truly how
good it is in terms of audio performance. And then there's the fact that
it's been over 10 years since I have listened to vinyl and need to
"re-learn" what it is supposed to sound like.

I did replace the cartridge at one point with a $75 one... at the moment I
have no idea what exact cartridge it is. (Turntable is still up on a shelf
in a box... just trying to figure out how much trouble it will be to get
this thing going before I even take it out). Once I do set it up, I am of
course interested in setting it up in the best way possible. I don't think
I need a $5k pre-amp however.

Recently a few friends of mine who are pretty experienced in audio did some
comparison tests on their own, CD verses SACD verses vinyl, etc. They claim
that the vinyl just blew everything away and had a sense of depth and space
that the CD and SACD did not have. It is obvious to me that their tests
were not conducted in the most accurate way, so I am curious to try some
tests on my own in a more controlled manner.

I have been more concerned lately about the sense of "depth" and "dimension"
that is either present or not on a given recording or medium. I hear very
big differences in "dimension" on different recordings and am just trying to
learn more about this in general. I wish to "train" my ears to be able to
perceive such different levels of "dimension" without having to do A/B
comparison tests. This dimensional thing is important to me, I guess one
needs to fully understand something before one can attempt to reproduce /
preserve it.

My friends would have me think that the 16-bit 44.1k CD medium is horrible
and that there is much greater quality to be had via other mediums. It
makes sense that they may be correct, but I wonder how much of a difference
we are talking about here. They claimed that the SACD was "better" than the
CD, with the most obvious difference being a sweeter more refined top end.
By comparison, they felt that the top end of the CD was more harsh and
crunchy.

What is an SACD anyway? Is this 24-bit, 96k? I wonder when the next new
"better" mass production audio medium will arrive. This may dictate how we
record albums today. For instance, I have been recording multitrack at
24-bit, 44.1k, with the idea that the end medium is going to be 44.1k.
However, if we know that in 3 years from now we will have a new medium at
96k, then I would want to multitrack in 96k, etc.



--------------
No, you need a phono preamp.

You can get a $20 one from Calrad. You can get a $5,000 one from
Millennia.
The Millennia one sounds better than the Calrad.

What kind of cartridge are you using?
--scott

Rick Hollett wrote:
You can get a $20 one from Calrad. You can get a $5,000 one from
Millennia.

Never would have guessed that one Scott!

It's starting to wear, isn't it? It's not as good a contrast either, now
that the Millennia prices have come down so much.

I did a DIY article on a pretty good INA-103-based one that used passive
equalization in Positive Feedback magazine. I think our own Paul Stamler
did a couple DIY articles on preamps with hybrid equalization in Audio
Amateur. If you're cheap, I think parts to build mine came to around $75
plus board, and the boards aren't available any more so you'll have to
perfboard it.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

WideGlide wrote:

I have an Harmon Kardon turntable, about 18 years old maybe... I think it
had cost about $200 - $300 new... it isn't state of the art, but it's
probably better than most low-end consumer units. I bought it back before I
really understood good audio, so at this moment I have no idea truly how
good it is in terms of audio performance. And then there's the fact that
it's been over 10 years since I have listened to vinyl and need to
"re-learn" what it is supposed to sound like.

HK made some good turntables. They also rebadged some Japanese direct-drive
junk. You'll know the difference when you hear it.

I did replace the cartridge at one point with a $75 one... at the moment I
have no idea what exact cartridge it is. (Turntable is still up on a shelf
in a box... just trying to figure out how much trouble it will be to get
this thing going before I even take it out). Once I do set it up, I am of
course interested in setting it up in the best way possible. I don't think
I need a $5k pre-amp however.

Okay, you need to know what cartridge you've got so you have some notion
of what the output level and required loading is. My guess is that if it
is something in the $75 range it is probably a low-end moving coil that
will want a 47k load. This gives you a very wide range of preamps to choose
from.

Recently a few friends of mine who are pretty experienced in audio did some
comparison tests on their own, CD verses SACD verses vinyl, etc. They claim
that the vinyl just blew everything away and had a sense of depth and space
that the CD and SACD did not have. It is obvious to me that their tests
were not conducted in the most accurate way, so I am curious to try some
tests on my own in a more controlled manner.

If they are so gung-ho about this stuff, why don't you ask them to loan
you a turntable and preamp? I know I would under the same circumstances.

A lot of what is good about vinyl is that it doesn't get louder if you
aggressively limit, so there is less of a push to be abusive in mastering.
There's still some badly abused stuff out there, but the format limits
just how much you can get away with. This alone is a good argument to
spend the money for a good turntable in my opinion.

I have been more concerned lately about the sense of "depth" and "dimension"
that is either present or not on a given recording or medium. I hear very
big differences in "dimension" on different recordings and am just trying to
learn more about this in general. I wish to "train" my ears to be able to
perceive such different levels of "dimension" without having to do A/B
comparison tests. This dimensional thing is important to me, I guess one
needs to fully understand something before one can attempt to reproduce /
preserve it.

If the tonality is not right and the dynamics are not right, the imaging
will never be right. If you can get a real sense of image, you've got a
few other things at least in the ballpark.

My friends would have me think that the 16-bit 44.1k CD medium is horrible
and that there is much greater quality to be had via other mediums. It
makes sense that they may be correct, but I wonder how much of a difference
we are talking about here. They claimed that the SACD was "better" than the
CD, with the most obvious difference being a sweeter more refined top end.
By comparison, they felt that the top end of the CD was more harsh and
crunchy.

Have your friends compare some of the JVC XRCD issues with the original
LPs. I think they might be surprised just how good it's possible for
16/44.1 to be when people who care about sound quality are on both sides
of the recording chain.

Yeah, there are a lot of CDs out there that are harsh and crunchy, but I
don't think is inherent in the medium, because I have heard a few that were
not.

What is an SACD anyway? Is this 24-bit, 96k? I wonder when the next new
"better" mass production audio medium will arrive. This may dictate how we
record albums today. For instance, I have been recording multitrack at
24-bit, 44.1k, with the idea that the end medium is going to be 44.1k.
However, if we know that in 3 years from now we will have a new medium at
96k, then I would want to multitrack in 96k, etc.

No, SACD isn't PCM at all. There's a nice discussion of how it works on
the Philips site. It's going to require a totally different approach if you
want to run DSD throughout the recording process. Personally, I'm keeping
the Ampex.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

Scott Dorsey wrote:
I did replace the cartridge at one point with a $75 one... at the moment I
have no idea what exact cartridge it is. (Turntable is still up on a shelf
in a box... just trying to figure out how much trouble it will be to get
this thing going before I even take it out). Once I do set it up, I am of
course interested in setting it up in the best way possible. I don't think
I need a $5k pre-amp however.

Okay, you need to know what cartridge you've got so you have some notion
of what the output level and required loading is. My guess is that if it
is something in the $75 range it is probably a low-end moving coil that
will want a 47k load. This gives you a very wide range of preamps to choose
from.

ARGHH....Moving MAGNET. I need sleep.
--scott


--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

Fostex used to sell one pretty inexpensively, but they move stuff
around so fast it may not longer be avaiable. If you're a DAW user and
your life seems inconmplete (and you have some time to wait), the
Mackie Big Knob master workstation controller has a phono preamp built
in (as well as a bunch of other neat features).

My usual advice for someone who's looking for a one shot solution,
that is you want to spend the next few months of evenings transferring
your LP collection to CD and they you won't need it again, is to buy a
stereo receiver at a yard sale or thrift shop for $10 or so, plug the
turntable into the Phono inputs, and connect the Tape Outputs to your
computer interface.

Of course if you want to get really serious about it, you'll want to
get a $1500 turntable and a $500 cartridge, and a high quality preamp
with lots of EQ that you can tweak, really great monitors so you'll
know when you've tweaked it right. You might even want to play with an
expander to counteract the compression that was added in cutting to
keep a decent signal-to-noise ratio on the pressing.


--
I'm really Mike Rivers )
However, until the spam goes away or Hell freezes over,
lots of IP addresses are blocked from this system. If
you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring
and reach me he double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo

Scott Dorsey wrote in message
...

I did a DIY article on a pretty good INA-103-based one that used passive
equalization in Positive Feedback magazine. I think our own Paul Stamler
did a couple DIY articles on preamps with hybrid equalization in Audio
Amateur.

Actually passive EQ; I diagrammed a passive network that could be used
between just about any clean, flat amplifiers, from the halves of a 5532 on
up to very fancy stuff. The network should cost about $7 for an RIAA-only
unit, and with a pair of 5532s and a power supply you should be in business.
The power supply, of course, is a non-trivial issue. As are the box to put
it in, in/out, etc.. The articles were in audioXpress in 2002 and 2003.

Peace,
Paul