Awesome Audiophile Snake Oil

Little known added benefit of CD-shaving: If you add the leftover shavings to a stir-fry, it adds depth and clarity to the meal's eatstage.

When I worked at a record store I rejected a collection of hundreds of CDs because they were all shaved and green-markered. The guy must have sold them privately because one of our regulars later brought in a bunch of them to sell and I had to reject them all over again.

I guess if they play fine who care, but those are damaged, and the real possibility is they actually shaved into the part that can oxidize

Still a devalued green shaved product, hah

never heard of shaving - sounds fun - but lots of delamination of cd-r's blue 90's gold

tfw when you find out the new belt you need for your turntable is going to cost $50

ADVANCED EBLT UPGRADE DRIVE BELT

The advanced EBLT drive belt is fitted as standard to all Planar 1, Planar 1 Plus, Planar 2, Planar 3 and Planar 6 models.

Each belt is moulded on our highly accurate custom tooling using a unique secret blend. Once moulded, the belts are cryogenically frozen and barrelled to remove any excess flash in order to create perfect cross-sectional roundness which is critical for accurate speed and stability. In normal use and conditions, the lifespan of the EBLT drive belt is 50% longer than the previous model.

Below you can see a direct comparison taken from our custom test software. You can compare the old belt (top) versus the latest EBLT reference belt (bottom). We have used the same Planar 1 turntable. The only part that has changed is the drive belt. You can clearly see a notable reduction in weighted peak Wow / Flutter measurements produced by the increased accuracy and cross-sectional roundness of the EBLT belt. The standard belt measures 0.253% / the Advanced EBLT measures 0.162% and the Reference EBLT measures 0.075%

tbh just get a large rubber band

unique secret blend = usb

DON'T DO IT UMS THEY'RE TRYING TO COVER UP THE DIGITIZATION

Austin otm. I recently replaced a 20-year-old belt and honestly can't tell the difference. I'm sure even twine would do the trick.

Sadly the way Regas are made it needs to be very specific as you take the turntable off and switch the belt from 33 to 45 manually by placing the belt on a different gear and I haven't found anyone making generic equivalent :/

can't tell if you're joking. . .

thread delivers!

(all in good fun, of course. sorry your stuff is on the fritz.)

I have a Rega and cannot wait to get something else cause I hate their closed system. Internal ground is just the dumbest idea ever.

I've never had a problem w/grounding but yeah austin the length/width/tension of the belt is tied directly to the rpms and correct pitch

tbh the thing has been a tank for me, and in fairness it's probably closing in on 20 years old and i've never changed the belt

I have a Pro-Ject turntable with a similar set up: you have to remove the platter, then switch the belt to a different turnedy slot thingy (technical term) to change between 33 and 45. Cost about $25 to replace the 20-year-old original belt. I can't tell any difference.

But yeah, don't use twine. That was a joke.

I haven't found anyone making generic equivalent :/

I also recently replaced the felt mat on my turntable with a cork mat. The difference is astounding, in that I can't tell any difference at all.

Had a NAD rega clone for years and 'no little rubber band that I have to muck with to switch speeds' was a surprisingly high-priority requirement when I finally bought a new turntable

I don't play a lot of 45s, but if I had to disassemble my turntable every time I wanted to play one, I would probably play even fewer.

Yeah I'm not going to lie, I play my 45s far more infrequently because of this. It's not a huge effort, but enough to discourage me when I want a stress-free listening session.

I think there was a degree of impatience when I bought my Pro-Ject seven years ago; they didn’t have in the model I wanted (push button 33/45) so I walked out with the Debut Carbon, which is a lift off platter to change speed faff. I did that for years with my old Systemdek so I figured I’d just get used to it again (my later Michell had a freestanding motor housing, so moving the belt was easy).

But nope, 45s just don’t get played…

i have a pro-ject debut with manual speed change.
it's even more annoying for 12" that dont print the rpm speed on the labels.

Also annoying if you don't read the labels properly. Turns out I've been playing the second disc of Oval's 94 Diskont at the wrong speed for years...

I typed “rega drive belt” into eBay search and there are silicone belts for the Planar starting at $10 shipped, are they the wrong ones?
― assert (matttkkkk), Monday, September 19, 2022 3:48 PM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

good looking out, these will work i think...i forget google search is fucking useless these days sometimes

speaking of- who wants to start an audiophile curated search engine? all results will point the searcher to only the highest of fidelity.

it's a weekly subscription fee, of course.

Techmoan has a follow up where he investigates a device which demagnetises CDs. Spoiler, it ends as how you’d expect. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mH4v8b1tGSQ

That was amazing. If only there was a larger version to demagnetise the ink on my vinyl labels...

There appears to be a subculture of people who demagnetise vinyl LPs:
https://www.analogplanet.com/content/you-can%E2%80%99t-demagnetize-vinyl-you-can-demagnetize-record%E2%80%94-furutech-demag-alpha-and-stein-de3

Inevitably it ends up with the writer arguing that his "original pink label Island copy of Jethro Tull’s Stand Up that’s been repeatedly played since 1969 still has better high frequency extension than any CD". The other musicians he enjoys include Bob Dylan and Pat Metheny.

every true Tull head knows the CD book editions are the definitive and superior format for all of their releases up through the Broadsword and the Beast

* demagnetised tho

That's classic audiophile snake oil, taking something that is real (demagnetizing tape heads) and applying it to mediums that have nothing to do with magnetic tape

It never claimed to be a deultramagnetizer!

All you Pro-Ject people with the manual 33/45 change: does your platter not have a hole in it so that you can make the switch without actually removing the platter? On mine (don’t remember the model but it’s probably 25-30 years old now) you just rotate it so the hole is over the shaft and can then move the band with the little key thing. It’s never bothered me but having to actually remove the platter probably would.

After 2+ years of working at home I finally decided I needed a system in my basement office, and have lucked into three vintage turntables for a total of $10. All initially in rough shape but working well now after disassembly and cleaning/lubricating/some new parts; still need to take care of the cosmetics but I’m looking forward to comparing them. Dual 1219, Thorens TD165, and Pioneer PL-12 — all with speed selector switches!

definitely no hole on my MMF-5, somehow I lost the key long ago so I use 45 adapters

I really don't mind it so much, I knew what I was getting into when I bought it (in 2006, wow)

Listening to 45s is kind of annoying anyway so I don't care that much

No hole in my Debut Carbon platter - whole thing has to come off. All part of the ritual, yeah?

otm

No hole on my 15-year-old RPM5. IIRC you could buy a separate switch system for changing speed, but I play CDs now mostly and, when vinyl, 33 1/3 the vast majority of the time and don't mind switching manually.

I had never heard of this ridiculous method of changing speeds until looking at modern turntable options. Going to keep my garage sale Realistic working as long as possible!

My Debut II does have the platter holes but I don't have a doohickey to adjust the belt. I figured out how to do it with my fingers but it's a tight fit. Irrelevant if I get an acrylic platter, which I'm planning to do.

Iirc the point of manual switching is to reduce the number of moving parts, thus increasing reliability and reducing speed variance, wow and flutter etc. Worth the hassle in my book for a better sounding turntable that won't break the bank and is easy to service.

correct, I willingly made the tradeoff

and I def play more 45 rpm things than the average listener

I just use a technics 1200ish and rely on magic quartz crystals

xps I loved the sound of my TD160, but eventually found it unusably fussy. It was horribly susceptible to footfall (mounting it to the wall was the only way to kill that) and it was frustratingly creaky to start up — the table itself may have been a bit of a lemon rather than the model; the people I sold it to sold it on themselves after a short time. Then I ran Duals for a while, and I loved the automatic functions, but every one of them developed a quirk of some kind or other that rendered them each in turn unusable. I eventually settled on a Technics 1500c, brand new, in defiance of 30+ years of being a “vintage equipment guy.” It’s ok, although I think I’m going to have to get someone to beef up the lift mechanism which is unforgivably limp for a $1000 turntable.

I did get all the Duals fixed and I’m running the 701 as a secondary table.

For $10 you got an insane steal by any measure, though!

Ended up on the 1500c too when I returned to my vinyl last year - more than I hoped to spend but I love it. ikwym about the lift but for the most part it just feels so solid - I look at it and think 'I trust you'. Sounds good to me but I've been away from turntables for a while. May change the cartridge soon-ish, see how that changes the sound, and then demagnetise a few records after that.

This speed-change talk reminded me of my old 1970s Crown music-centre - my first "hi-fi", a hand-me-down from my sister-in-law.
I was convinced that it was playing vinyl too fast, so I spent an afternoon sometime in summer '90 adding layers of self-adhesive tennis racket towelling grip to the sub-platter to change the ratio and slow it down. Obviously it wasn't audiophile-grade tennis racket towelling grip but it did the job.

Recently I found some old tapes I made on that system, likely pre-tennis tweak. They were hilariously fast. I played my C90 of Faith by The Cure on my gf's Technics tape deck; Primary runs about six seconds shorter than on Spotify :) No wonder everything was so exciting back then. Even The Cure.

I have an older direct drive automatic turntable and it is wonky, the manual change thing is much more solid

I don't personally find it onerous

I personally feel like people like having 45s way more than they listen to them

The speed on my low-end Technics DD table had recently started acting really wonky with random slide-whistle changes during play. I opened it up to try and clean the guts of the switch (one of those metal slider toggle things), but while following the advice to click it back and forth a bunch of times, the plastic bit connecting the metal switch to the inner workings snapped in half. D'oh! I Krazy Glued it back into place, but some glue got somewhere it shouldn't have and now it's just fused in the 33 position. I never actually listen to 45s on it, so, hey.

Similar thing happened to my Rotel turntable (which is close to 30 years old at this point). The speed would fluctuate in a wacky manner. Took it to get fixed, and the guy said, "How often do you play 45s?" Almost never. "The switch became oxidized from never being used, which is causing the speed issues -- you should click it a bunch of times every time you use the turntable." That was 10 years ago and I haven't had that issue since.

Well that's why I like manual belt drive turntable like a Pro-Ject. These kind of issues could never happen. Speed issues? Buy a new belt for under $20, problem solved.

Plus these decks really punch above their weight with the right cartridge. Recently upgraded to an Ortofon 2M Red and the difference is night and day. I'm tempted to check out the Blue but I'm also not a millionaire and I've read it can be fussier. I'm pretty happy where I've landed tbh.