Very cool, someday I hope to have room for a separate mono setup just for my 78s.
Yes, that is a great idea.
I haven't done much listening with mono equipment. One exception was when one of my Quad ESLs was on the fritz, and I listened to the other with the mono switch on the amp in. I played discs from The Beatles Mono Box Set.
I have to say that I've never heard The Beatles sound more "Beatley", if that makes sense to anyone. Mono Beatles through a single Quad ESL sounds so exactly right, like a Beatles archetype.
The QUAD ESL speakers are so wonderful. Listening to the Beatles through the QUAD’s must sound amazing.
On another note, that Garrard headshell and tonearm look like a locomotive pulling a train going around a bend!
It certainly does look heavy, like a locomotive, but the tracking weight is adjustable and is correctly set for the Shure M7D installed in the system.
Congratulations on your system - it looks great - like a working museum display!
Thanks. One of my goals in setting up this system was to use period consistent components.
Awesome indeed.
It presents beautifully, and must sound incredible.
I sometimes spin my inherited 45's (from my Father - RIP), but on my 2 channel system.
Nothing wrong with the elegant simplicity of Mono. And your system looks the part.
Contrats on owning it.
Thank you for the comment. I too, up until I set this system up, played my monophonic records through my stereo system with pretty good results.
… That is a nice clean system. I have The Craftsmen amplifier from like 1952 in good shape, I got the speaker and the receiver with it too. Maybe someday...
Craftsmen made some excellent amplifiers in the early days of Hi-Fi. I own three Craftsmen amplifiers (RC-2, C-400, C-500) and a preamp/tuner (RC-10) all of which sound pretty darn good. Based on my experience, a monophonic system built around Craftsmen components sounds sweet.
I have acquired some monaural albums and have wondered how they would sound with a mono cart.
Yesterday, I got together with a group of friends for the music listening session. This is something we do from time to time. We usually have a theme for our sessions. Yesterday’s theme was monophonic LP recordings for which there was no stereo counterpart. The host for yesterday’s session has a very nice setup (SOTA turntable, modern Grado tonearm) for playing monophonic records, including a Shure M5D true monophonic cartridge and a preamplifier with all the EQ setting to play the records that were made before the RIAA equalization curve was made the standard. According to him, the Shure M5D is the best cartridge he has used for playing LP monophonic records.
My takeaway for our listening session was that the true monophonic cartridge makes a significant improvement compared to the stereo cartridges that I have tried (Shure M7D, M44-7) when used to play early LP records. If you are into records from that era, I would highly recommend obtaining a Shure M5D or other high quality monophonic cartridge.