Laser Turntable; buy one now for only $9000!

[bayswater]

e) I never step on it in the middle of a take.

[mikehalloran]

e) I never step on it in the middle of a take.

Yes! I knew I was missing something.

I used to use coil cords for that exact reason but they died of old age. When I went to the manufacturers of ProCo and I forget whom, they said they couldn't get the cable anymore. They replaced them with regular cable under the lifetime warranties. Grrrr...

[James Steele]

http://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/MJazz12A

Now I could see a specialized Rock instrument cable if they could guaranty things like

a) will survive a Keith Moon style hotel room trashing

b) cannot be lost by a roadie ever – I'd settle for a FindMyCable.app on my iPhone

c) never comes unplugged if a drunk pulls on it during a bar gig

d) delivers non-fatal knockout jolt if bass is handled by unauthorized person

e) …

[Shooshie]

As far as I'm concerned, there are two kinds of cable: studio and touring. Studio cables can be less-than-sturdy if they have high-quality shielding, for once they are laid, they tend to stay there. And of course, anyone who lays a cable in a studio does their best to get all the kinks out, and to lay them near a natural conduit, like a baseboard, or under a subfloor.

But touring cables need connectors you can roll a tank over, without interrupting transmission. Or more accurately, roll an Anvil™ case over, or one of the hundreds of knock-offs. I've watched stage-hands and general back-stage hangers-on standing around my MIDI cable coils, hoping they didn't get near my connectors, only to find later a completely flattened MIDI connector on a 50' cable for which I had no backup. It's like they thought it was a cigarette butt, and were determined to put it out. (and it was flattened like a cigarette butt)

Shooshie

[monkey man]

Not just that, Stoivo...

As someone with this background my biggest objection with the $9000 laser turntable is that it's not keeping the vinyl record playback in the analog domain,so in my opinion besides it being expensive it defeats the entire purpose of playing a record on a great analog system. If you ever listened to a great turntable in an amazing high end stereo(most people haven't) you'd never want a laser turntable.
The whole idea of a high end turntable is to avoid the digital domain with the associated digital to analog conversion.
If the person has the money and they love the sound of records $9,000 is really not expensive in the world of turntables when you truly get into the realm of high end Hi-Fi.

What about the subtle effects of tracking lag / sag and the inertia of the needle and assembly?

I s'pose this could be simulated in software if it's a digital unit, or perhaps in an analogue circuit employing opto / photo emitters and receivers or whatever (I obviously know nothing about this stuff).

[musicman691]

At last, a setup not likely to jump grooves while trying to play the Telarc recording of the 1812 Overture.

http://store.acousticsounds.com/d/84480 ... nyl_Record

There's always the old pennies on the cartridge top trick to make it work. I have that vinyl somewheres around here; the Denon direct drive turntable I have played it just fine the last time I played the record a few years back (sans pennies). Just adjusted the tracking a little.

[Shooshie]

My first record player was one of those little suitcase jobs, with a tone arm that had the look, size, shape, feel, and weight of an old steel Bostich Stapler — the big, office kind. It actually had a spring to hold it down, as if gravity pulling on its steel housing wasn't enough. But I think it would have played records upside down. There was a constant underlying noise, a scraping sound, which many years later I realized was the sound of vinyl being gouged. I was just 4 years old, and the stack of 45s included Elvis, Roy Rogers, Bob Wills, Tony Bennett, and others who were then new artists, like Elvis. I'm sure those records, un-gouged, would fetch a nice price on eBay these days.

The most predominant feature I remember about my old record player, besides the fact that it was in a suitcase and colored blue, was the 60 cycle hum. I just thought that was part of recorded sound. It wasn't a real recording if it didn't hum a low B.

Shoosh

[bayswater]

My first record player was one of those little suitcase jobs,

Mine too. But what I remember about it: I enjoyed the music on it just as much as on the long line of its very expensive successors.

[HCMarkus]

My first record player was one of those little suitcase jobs,

Mine too. But what I remember about it: I enjoyed the music on it just as much as on the long line of its very expensive successors.

This.

We've come so far, yet the simple joys of childhood remain just beyond our grasp.

[Shooshie]

My first record player was one of those little suitcase jobs,

Mine too. But what I remember about it: I enjoyed the music on it just as much as on the long line of its very expensive successors.

This.

We've come so far, yet the simple joys of childhood remain just beyond our grasp.

Yes! Most of all, I remember the fascination with how records worked. I finally got a sewing needle and held it in the groove, and... whoa! I could hear the sound! I didn't have the vocabulary to describe it, but on a visceral level I had learned my first lesson about waves and sound. That curiosity has stayed with me, and particularly the stuff about waves. I think I've listened to every lecture or interview with Richard Feynman about waves in physics, for his innate fascination with the subject reverberates with my own. Isn't it funny how things we pick up at 3 or 4 years of age stay with us the rest of our lives? Those are the things I return to when I need to be "home."

Shooshie

[musicman691]

My first record player was one of those little suitcase jobs, with a tone arm that had the look, size, shape, feel, and weight of an old steel Bostich Stapler — the big, office kind. It actually had a spring to hold it down, as if gravity pulling on its steel housing wasn't enough. But I think it would have played records upside down. There was a constant underlying noise, a scraping sound, which many years later I realized was the sound of vinyl being gouged. I was just 4 years old, and the stack of 45s included Elvis, Roy Rogers, Bob Wills, Tony Bennett, and others who were then new artists, like Elvis. I'm sure those records, un-gouged, would fetch a nice price on eBay these days.

The most predominant feature I remember about my old record player, besides the fact that it was in a suitcase and colored blue, was the 60 cycle hum. I just thought that was part of recorded sound. It wasn't a real recording if it didn't hum a low B.

Shoosh

My old grammar school had a bunch of those donated to it - we learned quickly enough not to bring in anything from home as the records were getting trashed in no time at all.

Our home one had a walnut cabinet about 18 inches on a side with a lid, small 6 inch speaker and a tube amp (can't remember if it was 1 or 2 tubes). Served well until one day I decided to see how it would sound with my cheapy guitar connected to it. I jury rigged a cable from my guitar into where the tone arm was connected; interesting sound but not much volume. Didn't know about impedance matching on the input side of things at the time. Needless to say it never functioned again as a record player. Parents were not happy.