My Buddy Wants to Sell Me His Technics SL-1200MK2

...Read about the mods online you can do to the 1200...

By all means read about the 'mods' but take them with a grain of salt. Leave the platter alone, don't screw with the arm wiring, the RCA cables are excellent already, leave the power supply and strobe alone and keep the arm- it's really good.

The only 'mod' worth bothering with IMO, is the KAB fluid damper and that is for specific cartridge combos only.

Most of the 'mods' are stupid and are nothing more than the HiFi equivalent of this:

ricer02.JPG

Essentially take something that was well designed and f$#k it completely.
 
By all means read about the 'mods' but take them with a grain of salt. Leave the platter alone, don't screw with the arm wiring, the RCA cables are excellent already, leave the power supply and strobe alone and keep the arm- it's really good.

The only 'mod' worth bothering with IMO, is the KAB fluid damper and that is for specific cartridge combos only.

Most of the 'mods' are stupid and are nothing more than the HiFi equivalent of this:

View attachment 1116095

Essentially take something that was well designed and f$#k it completely.

The only thing that I would agree about is the arm....
 
$500 seems actually a little high to me, BUT... if it is truly pristine I doubt you will regret it. Everyone needs at least one Technics.
I totally disagree - a 1200 that is eight years old with low hours is certainly worth 500. And can fairly easily be sold for that amount whenever. Think of it as free rental for ten years!
 
I expect the 1200 will be sonically better than your current tables however the weak link in your system appears to be your Sony AV receiver/amplifier. May be better using the funds in that area.
 
Personally I prefer to do the groundless RCA cable conversion on 1200's, one less wire to deal with and better wire & connectors. A properly setup 1200 mkII with a Stanton 681 or 881 series cartridge is a wonderful combination. Setting one up is very easy.

I paid $200 for two 1200 M3D's about 5 years ago. I kept the best one and instantly sold the other for $150 (had a broken anti-skate spring) on Craigslist. I had to replace the RCA leads on the one I kept and did the groundless conversion as a kit for $37. I already had a collection of Stanton cartridges mounted in the correct Technics headshells so I was good to go. I've seen really nice 1200 mkII's with asking prices over $1,000.
 
I expect the 1200 will be sonically better than your current tables however the weak link in your system appears to be your Sony AV receiver/amplifier. May be better using the funds in that area.
Have you heard that one or is it just AV receivers on principle?
 
The only thing that I would agree about is the arm....

And the only thing I would agree with about your previous statement regarding changer turntables is... nothing. Keep making blanket statements like you did and see how far it gets you here. The BIC 40z I have sounds very good and yes I sometimes even stack records on it.
 
Restorer-John hit the mark re the 1200 modifications/upgrades, the only one that amounts to anything is the KAB fluid damper and that's cartridge specific,
not necessary if you picked a decent cartridge that is a good match considering compliance and weight. Also agree that the next move would be to replace the AV receiver with a 2ch analog receiver, integrated analog preamp/amp or separate analog preamp/amp.
 
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