Parallax982
Super Member
I'm totally new to turntables (unless you include my experience as a teen in the 1970s when I had a 10 watt Kenwood receiver with a pair of Realistic speakers and a cheap turntable. For the last several years, I've been getting deeper and deeper into the rabbit hole of vintage audio gear. At this point, I have really nice stuff. A fully restored Marantz 2270 with engraved faceplate, a fully restored Marantz 2230 with engraved faceplate, two fully restored Fisher tube amps (a 400 and an 800C), two more unrestored (another 400 and an 800B), a Lowrey tube amp converted to stereo hifi (I call it my FrankenLowrey), a DS-1 single ended tube amp, Klipshorn speakers, Coral BX300 speakers, ElectroVoice EV4 speakers plus streamers and good quality DACs.
The thing I've steered clear of is turntables. Just one more rabbit hole and a particularly finicky one to boot. But someone's been advertising a Rotel RP1100 which appeared to be in good shape except the owner said the motor was dead for $50. I just watched. Today he dropped the price to $25 so I picked it up. Looked perfect -- like new. So I asked the guy for the history. He bought it from a hifi store a few years ago. It worked great until recently. He brought it in to have it serviced. New belt, new parts, he spent $300 on it, but the motor wasn't working. The shop was looking for a replacement motor and then his wife bought him a new Marantz turntable. He told me he liked the sound of the Rotel better but it's not a huge difference so he decided to keep the new one.
I took it home expecting to have to troubleshoot and probably replace the motor but when I plugged it in, the damn thing worked. It tracks quite well. My phone measured it at 33.29 with a WOW of .34. On the 45 setting, it showed 44.87. Don't remember the WOW. Probably similar. The stylus, as best I can tell, looks good. I don't have a microscope. I'll buy a cheap $1 record at the thrift store tomorrow and give it a listen.
What can you fellas tell me about this turntable. I'm going to hook it up to the Fisher 400 with the Klipschorns. Will I get better sound than streaming with Qobuz?
The thing I've steered clear of is turntables. Just one more rabbit hole and a particularly finicky one to boot. But someone's been advertising a Rotel RP1100 which appeared to be in good shape except the owner said the motor was dead for $50. I just watched. Today he dropped the price to $25 so I picked it up. Looked perfect -- like new. So I asked the guy for the history. He bought it from a hifi store a few years ago. It worked great until recently. He brought it in to have it serviced. New belt, new parts, he spent $300 on it, but the motor wasn't working. The shop was looking for a replacement motor and then his wife bought him a new Marantz turntable. He told me he liked the sound of the Rotel better but it's not a huge difference so he decided to keep the new one.
I took it home expecting to have to troubleshoot and probably replace the motor but when I plugged it in, the damn thing worked. It tracks quite well. My phone measured it at 33.29 with a WOW of .34. On the 45 setting, it showed 44.87. Don't remember the WOW. Probably similar. The stylus, as best I can tell, looks good. I don't have a microscope. I'll buy a cheap $1 record at the thrift store tomorrow and give it a listen.
What can you fellas tell me about this turntable. I'm going to hook it up to the Fisher 400 with the Klipschorns. Will I get better sound than streaming with Qobuz?
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