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Technics SL-1310 Mk2 vs Hitachi HT-860

Which Would You Buy

  • Technics SL-1310 Mk2

    Votes: 6 66.7%

  • Hitachi HT-860

    Votes: 3 33.3%
  • Total voters
    9
As much as I like Hitachi as a brand and they had many great products. From my experience, the Technics (at least their better consumer line tables) are hard to find fault or beat. They may have potential issues (like any other table of the era due to age), but they have been quite reliable.

I've had many Hitachi tables, though not as complicated as this particular tables. I've had Pioneers, Marantz, Sony. I've always kept a Technics tables. They always seemed to be better built, yes there are exceptions (Sony PS-2250 series is a fantastic manual table).

I've always preferred the 1600mkii family over the 1300mkii due to having a better VTA adjustment, design, and honestly reliability. Less failures with the 1600mkii family.

Honestly, I think the new SL-1500C is a nice table and definitely worth the price.
 
Got the HT-860 out of the box today. Quartz lock isn't working but looks like there is an adjustable resistor I can play with to fix it up. Going to try that later tonight.
 
Technics/Panasonic/National is a large corporation with great expertise and a large budget for R&D. Hitachi is a large corporation with great expertise and a large budget for R&D. In the US, Technics is better known for audio equipment, and they certainly had (and may still have) outstanding facilities for audio research and manufacturing. But Hitachi is also a very high tech company, and, though less well known in the US for audio, I remember being surprised to read a British review of a Hitachi tuner that commented on their excellent reputation in Europe. So maybe they focused on different markets.
Obviously the better Technics tables are very fine, but that doesn't imply that they are better than other tables. The concerns raised about the potential for problems with replacement parts are valid, but it is impossible to know what is going to fail and when. So I hope the OP loves the table and, once fixed, it runs like a top.
 
To clarify about the "warbling noise", that's based off one review for the EPC-270 cart on vinylengine (the first one at the top), together with a couple of people citing motor interference issues with Hitachi. It could be that these tables just attract criticsm for whatever reason, that's been my impression anyway.

Compared with a Thorens TD280 MkII, the Hitachi easily wins, just that the Thorens has more bounce and musicality for some non-hifi guitar stuff like niche indie records recorded/pressed on a shoestring. And I'm wondering maybe for more rocky/metal stuff - will be testing that when I get a phono stage to use it as a second, not just a backup.

The Hitachi excels with anything remotely electronic, jazz, ambient, experimental, psych, and good quality pressings/recordings in general. It's fussy about cartridges, showing big differences. For instance the much lauded budget ATVM95E sounds so weak and tinny (yes I have heard it sounding better with even more capacitance on a modern Technics - I don't think I hear capacitance differences with that cart providing it's all under about 400pF, but very much do with old Shure/Ortofon).

I still want my old SL1200 MkII back but after putting around 1000 hours on the Hitachi it is very much "my table" and I'm more than happy with it.

As an aside after much experimentation I've ditched alignment protractors. This might seem insane, but carts sound better set square at 50mm from washer to stylus tip using a Technics gauge marked 2mm from the front. There's another member here who found this also.
 
Got it up and running. Quartz lock is working a treat again.

Had to reopen it up because the down button wasn’t working properly. A little deoxit seems to have fixed it.

I’m going to have to cut a piece of paper to cover the light sensors for my clear records.
 

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Nat said:
Technics/Panasonic/National is a large corporation with great expertise and a large budget for R&D. Hitachi is a large corporation with great expertise and a large budget for R&D. In the US, Technics is better known for audio equipment, and they certainly had (and may still have) outstanding facilities for audio research and manufacturing. But Hitachi is also a very high tech company, and, though less well known in the US for audio, I remember being surprised to read a British review of a Hitachi tuner that commented on their excellent reputation in Europe. So maybe they focused on different markets.
Obviously the better Technics tables are very fine, but that doesn't imply that they are better than other tables. The concerns raised about the potential for problems with replacement parts are valid, but it is impossible to know what is going to fail and when. So I hope the OP loves the table and, once fixed, it runs like a top.
Click to expand...
Hitachi in the USA was better known as an OEM in terms of audio and an electronic parts supplier than they were for their own audio components. My favorite era for Hitachi Audio was pre-1973.
 
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