Who here owns their ultimate/dream/"grail" turntable and what is it?

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I don’t have the money to chase specific high end gear. For me it has been more of coming across some very nice tables by chance and upgrading that way.
A couple summers ago I came across a beautiful SOTA Star Sapphire table with a Eminent Technology air bearing liner tonearm. Found it at a garage sale, came with a Monster Alpha Genesis 1000 cartridge mounted and a brand new spare Lyra Lydian Beta cartridge.

I don’t think I’ll stumble across anything better for a while, but you never know!
 
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I don’t have the money to chase specific high end gear. For me it has been more of coming across some very nice tables by chance and upgrading that way.
A couple summers ago I came across a beautiful SOTA Star Sapphire table with a Eminent Technology air bearing liner tonearm. Found it at a garage sale, came with a Monster Alpha Genesis 1000 cartridge mounted and a brand new spare Lyra Lydian Beta cartridge.

I don’t think I’ll stumble across anything better for a while, but you never know!
"Never" comes to mind.
 
Holy grail? How about good enough and likely my last? Just recently gave away an Ariston RD-11s with SME3009 arm purchased as a demo unit in '76 to our preacher. :)

VPI Scout with 300 RPM motor, Phoenix Technology Eagle power supply, Souther TQ-1 (now Clearaudio) arm with VPI/Dynavector DV20X on VPI HW-2 isolation platform.

Scout2018.jpg
 
Holy grail? How about good enough and likely my last? Just recently gave away an Ariston RD-11s with SME3009 arm purchased as a demo unit in '76 to our preacher. :)

VPI Scout with 300 RPM motor, Phoenix Technology Eagle power supply, Souther TQ-1 (now Clearaudio) arm with VPI/Dynavector DV20X on VPI HW-2 isolation platform.

Scout2018.jpg
That'll work.
 
for the last tt i will ever purchase, i have a SOTA Sapphire with a sumiko MMT tonearm (made by Jelco). my dream table would be the walker proscenium which is quite unlikely due to cost. it has an air bearing platter (60#) and an air bearing linear tonearm. current model price of $100k!
 
my dream table would be the walker proscenium which is quite unlikely due to cost. it has an air bearing platter (60#) and an air bearing linear tonearm. current model price of $100k!
Another candidate for the "Nothing Succeeds like Excess" category is the Clearaudio Statement with Goldfinger cartridge. I heard it extensively at Sea Cliff - running a cool $150k at the time. Plus another $15k for the cartridge.

Interestingly, my 1984 Souther arm is a progenitor to its highly refined linear arm. It weighs over 700 lbs and shares design aspects from a ceiling fan and Nautilus workout gear. The upper section gimbals in every direction attached to a colossal set of weights for mass loading. Gently nudge it and it easily swings in any direction. The lower platter assembly is belt driven by multiple motors with the upper platter, magnetically.

Playing discs was very much a ceremony. First clean with an HW-17 followed by Furutech destat, stylus clean and final placement of rim weight on top of vinyl. Entire arm tower moves fore and aft. I was really careful cueing discs! Audiophile stoners need not apply. ;)

clearaudiostmt.jpg
 
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Another candidate for the "Nothing Succeeds like Excess" category is the Clearaudio Statement with Goldfinger cartridge. I heard it extensively at Sea Cliff and running a cool $150k at the time. Plus another $15k for the cartridge.

Interestingly, my 1984 Souther arm is a progenitor to its highly refined linear arm. It weighs over 700 lbs and shares design aspects from a ceiling fan and Nautilus workout gear. The upper section gimbals in every direction attached to a colossal set of weights for mass loading. Gently nudge it and it easily swings in any direction. The lower platter assembly is belt driven by multiple motors with the upper platter magnetically.

Playing discs was very much a ceremony. First clean with an HW-17 followed by Furutech destat, stylus clean and final placement of rim weight on top of vinyl. Entire arm tower moves fore and aft. I was real careful! ;)

clearaudiostmt.jpg
The ritual for my ET equipped VPI is somewhat less elaborate than that (no rim weight), and compared to my close-and-play Technics SL-7 with an optional stylus brushing.
No doubt, Peter's Statement is that I am not worthy.
 
ralph, the walker tt with the goldfinger would make me HAPPY. have you heard the walker? it is so vivid, i wasn't that impressed with the clearaudio oil derrick at Weinhart Design Audio in Bel Air California. Lloyd is kind of a character and he plays noisy records in his demos but a friend has one from when they were more realistically priced that he bought used for about $5k.

i once had a maplenoll athena, the same model that Enid Lumley gave a rave (very unusual for her). she came into music and sound in calif once and made mel schilling as nervous as a cat on a hot titanium roof. that was the tt that i found to be the best i ever had sonically but the SOTA is pretty good and the mmt allows me to swap carts quickly.
 
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Nice try1256 - did those isolators under the Sota leave a black mark on the top of the rack? Mine did and I was quite irritated since I ended up having to refinish it.
 
Oh I have owned some decent tables, but not really a grail table. Lets see, have owned a Thorens TD 124, Garrard 401, Teres 225, Townshend Rock MK III, a Well Tempered Record Player, Galibier Audio Serac, and a couple of others. All nice tables, but nothing grail like.

I currently own a Technics SP 10 MK II with 12" Riggle String Theory arm. Also have a Denon DP 75 in VPI plinth and Acos GST 801 arm. Both nice tables, neither a grail though. Now if that was a Technics SP 10 MK III...that could be a grail. But I am a poor pig, and those require real money.

I have an audio experiment going, where I picked up a Sota Star Sapphire MK III table in beautiful condition, and have sourced a SME IV for it. The IV will get a rewire of internal silver cable, so it should be at SME V status. Its a proof of concept for me to see if I like a vacuum platter suspended belt drive table. If I do I might start planning for something like a Sota Nova.

But none of these are grail tables. A Sota Millenia might be, a Walker would be, perhaps the TOTL Merrill, or a TOTL Transrotor, or even a Well Tempered Reference, the Denon DP 100, that Technics SP10R. And when you go shopping for holy grail tone arms, then that becomes real money.

But hey I am just a pig ya know?

Cheers
Mister Pig
 
The MK2 holds its own fairly well @Mister Pig.

View attachment 1289708

It does, and I found it interesting that increasing the platter mass on the table with the SS aftermarket one did nothing positive for the sound. I preferred it with the stock platter, and in the high mass plinth. I also found it interesting that the obsidian plinth did not bring anything significant to the table either, over the one Larry Spence built me to the Jean Natais recipe.

Truth is I would have been content using the SP 10 MK II and DP 75. Then my friend goes waving a Sota under my snout that is in excellent condition and very reasonably priced. How could inquiring swine resist? We will see how this all turns out.

PS. I think you should spend some time fine tuning your speaker location. Just a saying,,,,

Cheers
Mister Pig
 
Another candidate for the "Nothing Succeeds like Excess" category is the Clearaudio Statement with Goldfinger cartridge. I heard it extensively at Sea Cliff - running a cool $150k at the time. Plus another $15k for the cartridge.



Interestingly, my 1984 Souther arm is a progenitor to its highly refined linear arm. It weighs over 700 lbs and shares design aspects from a ceiling fan and Nautilus workout gear. The upper section gimbals in every direction attached to a colossal set of weights for mass loading. Gently nudge it and it easily swings in any direction. The lower platter assembly is belt driven by multiple motors with the upper platter, magnetically.

Playing discs was very much a ceremony. First clean with an HW-17 followed by Furutech destat, stylus clean and final placement of rim weight on top of vinyl. Entire arm tower moves fore and aft. I was really careful cueing discs! Audiophile stoners need not apply. ;)

clearaudiostmt.jpg

Truly a beautiful and impressive table.
I think the OP (and for as long as the thread has run , I see it easily getting lost the fact that you were supposed to actually own).

I have several tables. None grail worthy.
Best I'd say a hybrid (Marc Morin/ Steve Frosten AR XA).
I love the sound but I'm a lazy A$$.
In a perfect world an automatic or a semi automatic would be nice.
Clearly I can lust after another TT.
From a sound perspective, I'm not wanting .
 
I think the OP (and for as long as the thread has run , I see it easily getting lost the fact that you were supposed to actually own).
Which was how I first responded with post # 126. The other was perhaps a slightly off topic reply to tommy about the Walker. Having said that, the post title is a bit misleading. There's already "whatcha got" posts. Who actually owns their perfect choice?

In a perfect world an automatic or a semi automatic would be nice.
Most manuals support end of record arm lift products like My Little Fwend. My arm came with one but honestly, I never bothered to set it up.
 
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