Tweaking my analog audio gear

You can call me a vinyl junky because I still love to play records inspite of the CDs, DVDs and MP3/iPod’s around us. With the nostalgia of  LPs I inherited from my father and the ones I bought during my first employment, I cannot just throw them away. For years, I kept my LPs with no turntable to play since my audio gear was carted away by a burglar years ago. The only time I can listen to LPs is - when I’m on vacation in our ancestral home in Kuguita, Mambajao, Camiguin (see the picture included in Ivan Henares’ blog)

My interest in pursuing turntables revived when I come across an article from Beat Reviews, a Singaporean hi-fi magazine, written by Gary Leonard Koh, CEO of Genesis Loudspeakers (http://www.genesisloudspeakers.com). The conclusion of his article "LPs vs SACDs" is  - LPs are much better than SACDs! But that was before he discovered Black CDs. I believe him is because he’s an authority but there’s no substitute with  first-hand experience.

Thanks to the Internet, I was able to gather lots of information about hi-fi DIYs and tweaking audio gears. Last X’mas/New Year vacation I had the time to tweak the turntable handed down to me from my brother who given up audio for higher pursuits. They’re not an audiophile class but decent ones.

After tweaking,  there’s big improvement in the sound - the instruments are more localized, the annoying buzz between piano passages is gone, more space, more detailed harmonics and quieter "needle sound". The improvement is very significant in the cymbals, piano and vocals. In the low end, I also notice that the bass notes are more defined. Before, I can’t differentiate the changes in one semitone. For some better recorded LPs, the sound is even better than my CDs!  There’s more presence in vinyl.

The tweaks I made are just simple like:

• Aligning the cartridge/stylus using a sewing thread as a guide so it should pass through the center line of the cartridge shell;
• Replacing my cork record mat with non-slip foam mat I found in a car accessory shop. I really wanted to try out the Janus TT mat (http://www.tnt-audio.com/clinica/januse.html) but I cannot find the tar damping material locally.;
• Sprayed contact cleaners of my Carver receiver’s switches & rotary controls.

My system is very inferior compared to real audiophile setup but  it’s the improvement that counts. I enjoyed playing my old LPs more this time.  Never mind the clicks and pops. It also help reminesce my younger days.

The exercise also made me respect the preciseness of  analog. It has to be setup to close tolerances to get the most out from them.

For the digital purist who disagrees that LP is better than CD, don’t worry,  top on my list is reclocking my DVD player with a low-jitter clock. You can search the Internet for terms like - cd jitter, low-jitter clock, audio DACs, etc. so you will have an idea why audiophiles shun CDs.  I’d like to encourage every CD owners to try this re-clocking tweak to keep the CD format alive. Otherwise, downloaded music files will kill CDs just like it did to nice sounding LPs.  Let’s keep the CDs alive as well!