“New” Linn LP12 Klimax

[admin]

Glad to hear that the vinyl is bringing you back from the digital. It's funny how the pendulum swings. It was just yesterday that I went in for a listening session and thought, "I haven't played an LP in 3 weeks" (I was gone for vacation for a week and half). I was listening to digital exclusively during this time period without much thought. Boy did it sound great. I love the sound of vinyl.

It's great to have these choices.

[AnotherJohnson]

Another day of vinyl crushing any ones or zeros that showed their heads.

I’ve been listening to albums where I’m my opinion the vinyl wasn’t very good.

The Etna Lambda has awakened them.

I thought I’d found a few clunkers that even the Etna Lambda couldn’t save … but then I noticed that the equalization had been inadvertently put on Columbia instead of RIAA. I hit the RIAA button on the remote and all was well.

I’ve had a killer high level vinyl playback capability literally for more than four decades. This one takes the cake.

[Big Dog RJ]

Yes! Can certainly confirm that as well, after picking up these two LP's. Really fantastic recordings. The Anne Bisson duet with this French cellist is superb! It has that total enveloping affect and the speakers simply disappear, leaving Anne Bisson sitting on my lap! It's of such high resolution, totally uncanny.

The John M collaboration with Shakti has mesmerising speed. It's fast and the transient attacks are razor sharp! Another excellent recording done somewhere in 80's.

Cheers to vinyl!
Woof! RJ

[AnotherJohnson]

I’ll have to listen to the Bisson duet. She did a concert as part of Axpona last month. I looked her up and played some of her digital content. I did not think she held her own against the best female vocalists in the genre. Based on your experience, I’m going to give her a second chance.

[tonye]

I’ve been told someone mentioned DS Audio above.

Here is a link to my audition.

https://www.conradjohnsonowners.com/vie ... cal#p23258

Huh? Can't you read? That's a rather "petty" comment on your part, huh?

I guess you don't read the Peanut Gallery... oh well, excuuuuuse me.

Anyhow, DS Audio has a very good design note for building an equalizer. I corresponded with someone who has built one and is running one of the top of the line DS Audio cartridges. According to his comments, the DIY version blows the commercial product out of the water... it removes most of the resonances that we are used to hear with a magnetic cartridge and the phase shifts in the filters that follow it. We have all grown to hear those and we like them. Getting rid of that is unsettling at first -so I was told. I mean, I love the sound of thermionic bliss and class A 2nd harmonic... distortions, but distortions that to me, us, sound like the real thing. It's like putting an NCore amp into your system, yikes, it was a difference alright, that's why it went back to the shelf... wait 'till I get my hands on the Purifi eval board!

But as usual it takes some skill and/or connections to get one such super-duper equalizer. You just can't buy your way in. Speaking of which, the cartridge runs $7500 but the DIY equalizer runs less than $1K out the door -if he builds it for me. The parts are really not that complicated, actually a lot cheaper than my current phono stage with all of its uber expensive caps, resistors, inductors, custom screen panel, etc..

The thing is that manufacturers need to build to a price point. The sky is never really the limit. Even for those Wilson speakers... You are paying for a lot of stuff beyond the IP, BOM and manufacturing costs. It's interesting thus that DS Audio actually provides the design notes for the equalizer.

In any event, I was told to stay with my DIY Pearl 2 phono stage ( I'm getting an upgraded DIY power supply with even better regulation and filtering, that ought to be interesting ) and move to an Ortofon Cadenza Black... but I think I'll wait, I like how my Grado sounds and it still has life on it. First I will do the ET3SE (line stage only) and then there are two more amp projects: Super SIT (*) and dual bridged F4s with a new balanced preamp, that preamp might be very interesting as it might end up being a huge custom transformer, and a TVC front it, with the necessary oomph to drive 28 Vrms into balanced cables. Might use a unity gain FET as impedance matching.

After that, I think I'll look at an Ekos 2 ( I keep looking for a used one... not many ) and for sure a Lingo 4 ( that will likely be a new one ). I was informed the Radikal was not necessarily that revolutionary (**). Anyhow, I'm not quite sure that there are still making many Lingo 4... issues with the supply chain I was told, but my guy thinks he knows where some NOS units are still available. The Keel is still out there... hmm...

But then I just got a hold of a few guys doing a DAC project... it sounds extremely interesting and the BOM, with populated cards, comes under $1500... all I have to do is get the case, a Raspberry Pi ( I got two spare ), power supply, put it together and calibrate it. I will likely write some of my own control software as well, Python is trivial and the device drivers are already written.

At some point I will retire. Right now I'm just working to get stereo stuff, it would seem.

(*) There are a high power MOSFET (A/B) and an SET MOSFET versions of that amp ( SAS252 ) but I think I want more Tonken SIT juice. Nothing like 50+ wpc of triode like transconductance. Right now i'm only getting 25 wpc. The SITs really put tubes to shame, sorry to say, but those SITs are outstanding.... in case you are wondering... remember how Sony got such lovely sounds from the VFETs? Well, those are SITs running in A/B mode. Just make sure to replace the Diodes of Death or the amp will turn to a boat anchor as the parts are unobtanium.

(**) Which is a pun, when you think about it... huh? Revolutions.... going around in circles... get it? F(t) = Asin(wt)... caspisce?

[AnotherJohnson]

How hard was the setup for the new cartridge? You've spoken a lot about the difficulty with setting up the Linn properly and how that is a fine art that few posses. Did you just swap the cartridge or was there something more involved?

Not sure how I missed this question. Unlike some I might miss, it was not intentional.

Changing a phono cartridge is always time consuming and tedious.

I first reinstalled the protector, and then removed the fastening screws to disengage from the headshell. Then I carefully removed the leads and labeled them, one at a time. My leads are not color coded, hence the need for labeling.

I boxed everything up, took it to Atlanta for the trade, and returned.

It took me a while to get motivated, but once ready, I moved the deck to my work table. Using Linn’s template, I got the new cartridge into the correct position … measure, move, measure, move … snug, check, if OK then torque.

Adjust balance to establish O Tracking force. Adjust tracking force to target. Check stylus rake angle (aka vta), and adjust pillar if necessary. Recheck VTF. Readjust if necessary. Check SRA again. Should be OK.

Set bias (aka antiskating force). Easy on Linn higher arms. Listen and adjust to preference. I generally like the stock setting (bias and vtf scales are coordinated on Ittok and Ekos models).

Put the deck back in place and check level. Adjust if needed.

It’s not like a P-Mount where even a careful 5th grader could do it because there are no adjustments. How well it is done has a significant impact on both sound and wear rates.

[tonye]

My tonearm is set to provide the tracking force statically.... without using the built in VTF adjustment.

It also runs no anti skating force. Whether to use it or not seems to be a religious endeavor.

What I found out makes the most difference, after tracking force -of course-, with my Grado Master 2 cartridge, is the tonearm height. My cartridge is VERY touchy with that. It got set up for middle of the pack LP thickness, which most of my LPs are. I suppose thin LPs are likely a lost cause and thick LPs play just fine.

I do wish the LP12 had an adjustable tonearm height gizmo... I've seen it aftermarket but I'm leery of putting non factory stuff on the table.

BTW, setting up a wooden body Grado is a nightmare... you can't see the stylus from the front very well. It's set well behind the front edge of the body.

[tonye]

Life is too short to take things way too seriously... bought some more records recently, this one caught my eye as my old LP is rather old and this is "audiophile" vinyl... so I splurged...

[admin]

Changing a phono cartridge is always time consuming and tedious.

That's what I thought. But well worth the effort.

I suppose thin LPs are likely a lost cause and thick LPs play just fine.

Can you put a LP matt under the thin ones to get them a little higher and compensate?

[AnotherJohnson]

Changing a phono cartridge is always time consuming and tedious.

That's what I thought. But well worth the effort.

I suppose thin LPs are likely a lost cause and thick LPs play just fine.

Can you put a LP matt under the thin ones to get them a little higher and compensate?

I’m assuming this last question relates to VTA/SRA.

This is a red herring. I’ve had tonearms with “VTA on the fly” adjustment. It’s never reliably repeatable. The sensitivity between arm height at the rear and VTA at the stylus is not super great. If you start keeping track of this for every record, you never get to actually listen. It is for the OCD.

The official Linn position, and some other tonearm manufacturers have come to this conclusion too, is that the loss in rigidity at the arm bearing degrades sound more than exact VTA gains. The Linn advice is to take a normal record, and set the pillar so that the arm is slightly raised up from parallel at the pivot end.

I’ve done comparisons with VPI unipivots and gimbals. In my opinion worrying about resetting VTA for every record is a waste of time, and creates more problems than it is supposed to solve. YMMV

[AnotherJohnson]

FWIW, adding mats affects the mechanical impedance of the record - platter interface. Another Linn official position is that the stock felt mat sounds best, and that one side sounds better than the other if the TT is set up optimally.

In Tom O’Keefe’s setup, you can hear the difference.

[tonye]

I've tried other mats... the standard Linn felt is the best indeed. The table is on the top shelf -levelled- of a Target TT5 filled with lead shot and with spikes into cups on the wood floor which is on a concrete slab. Followed Linn's instructions on this and it works extremely well in my house.

VTA, yeah, I know what Linn says about this... but sometimes, you know, I used to clean my stylus with sandpaper... never broke it. Maybe I was lucky. I mean, I follow their instructions.

However, I would like VTA.... I like being OCD, why not? I'm already OCD into what goes inside the boxes, the layout of the boards ( my amps are all symmetric inside), parts.... The monoblocks are even more symmetric (down to the connections!). I even specified the color of the LEDs and the type of power switches... There's my name on some of those boards!

I got four ACA amps... I had a guy rebuild and upgrade them to the latest version. He wired them all alike, with the same wire colors. options and routing inside. The caps/resistors/transistors are all identical. The 'serial numbers' are my name.... How cool is that?

Oh, the new power supply for the Pearl 2 showed up today. It makes an improvement. The music now allows the emotions of the singer to come through in their voice. I played Fleetwood Mac's Rumors... the one recorded while their personal relationships were falling apart.

Sat down at first to listen to one song... I got up once, to flip the record... got up again when the record was over. Wow. I had to shut the stereo down, couldn't listen anymore, I was quite sad for them. Their emotional pain came through loud and clear ( mind you, I'm a guy, and even so I could feel that... amazing!).

You hear Buckinghams strained voice in Go Your Own Way... and you realize how good this band was and the pain in the song... and THEN you get hit on the solar plexus when Christine McVie sings Songbird.

I'm getting pretty happy with my current set up... the Radikal really helped but the SIT amps and the Audio Notes were interesting additions to the Maggies and A2s. The system -and it is a SYSTEM- really is musical, it puts the music in the room and you can hear the strain in the voices clearly.

To hear the emotion in a singer's voice, so clearly, is moving. Whatever other distortions might be in my system, I just don't care, really. My wife noted last year that the 'stereo sounds like music not a stereo'. In the last 12 months I've taken some significant steps forward with it -actually more like 36 months when adding the design and planning phases. I can choose the soundstage by selecting which power amp and speaker combo to use... but the front end is clearly musical.

"...And I wish you all the love in the world.
But most of all, I wish it from myself.

And the songbirds keep singing, like they know the score
And I love you, I love you, I love you
Like never before, like never before, like never before."

Ratz!

Tomorrow I'll play Zappa and Yello. I was supposed to be listening to the power supply, not the music!

[Big Dog RJ]

Just listening to this one right now... superbly done !
I was very used to Keb Mo, Eric Bibb, BB etc., but this guy takes it to another level. Absolutely outstanding and on a fine label, Quality Reference Recordings on 45rpm.
Now I've collected about 5 of his albums on LP and this one's by far his best.

The transients and dynamics on the strings is fantastic, and the musicality is really really tops. Doesn't get any better than that.

Cheers to Doug M!
Woof! RJ

[pfmmx]

You both have very impressive LP12 set ups!

I bought an LP12 in 1982 for $895
I got a great deal on a Zeta tonearm. Built like a battleship.
A little high mass for a Linn. Despite this, my setup guy at Audio Perfection did a really nice job of setting it up.
I updated it with the circus bearing and Lingo 1. I used it for over 30 years. Never a problem.
Before switching to a TW Acoustic Raven AC3 - full copper 3 motor set-up, I had a Grado Statement 2 on my LP12. Very musical.
My LP12 is in my closet (Well packed, but collecting dust)
I am thinking of resurrecting it for a back-up system
-If I could find one, what would an EKOS cost in very good to excellent condition?
- I should probably have it set up again. My original guy at Audio Perfection retired.
-is there a set-up person of merit in Chicago(Not to far from Minneapolis where I live)

Thanks, and congrats on your very nice LP12's. It is a very well engineered, reliable and musical turntable.

[tonye]

I've been looking at the used Ekos for a while.

The lowest I've seen is 1500 and it goes up from there for the Ekos SE.

The Karousel is one heck of an upgrade though. I was planning on updating the Ittok to the EKos first but then I decided that the Radikal makes more difference. The advice I've been given by my tuner is that moving to an Ekos SE, and better, should be done with a Keel. So, for the time being, my upgrade path will be a Lingo 4 since I don't plan on installing the built in phono stage / DAC, hence I don't need the Radikal.

I'm in SoCal, so I can't help you on a tuner in Illinois.