Rather than buying yet another test pressing I decided to...

[Raven X Army]

splash out on a new turntable. To play them tests on.
My DENON seemed a bit too tired lately so I thought it was time to upgrade.

I'm not quite sure why but the last 4 record players I had I remember very clearly the first record I ever played to test ride the thing.
Turntable I had back in London was Technics SL-1200 Mark 4 and the first record I played on it was Earth Crisis All Out War test press from Conviction. Those were different times.

First one I bought in Japan was the extremely shitty Numark TTUSB. And that one was play tested using Slaughter and the Dogs Do It Dog Style DECCA test press
Upgrade from that was the DENON DP-300F and the first thing the needle touched was Judge Schism test
My newest best friend is this marble plinth magnificent creation: TEAC TN-570
I swapped the stock AT-100 cartridge first with the NAGAOKA MP-500, which costs almost as much as that record player, but I'm not an audiophile and I somehow prefer the beefier sound of the Ortofone RED so I popped that on and here's my first record when the whole thing was still just laid out on the floor.

[nico]

Those are nice choices made. I am slowly changing my setup from JVC end of nineties components to eighties Technics components. So I am getting rid of my minidisc player but that is fine.

My record players did change a lot over the years, but I am happy with my current ones.

[Raven X Army]

Mini disc haha
I still have a box of minidiscs somewhere that I recorded in the late 90s early 00s
Failed technologies are fun to look back on.

I have always had a soft spot for 1980 audio equipment. Especially VU meters. Looking at them needles makes listening to records a lot more entertaining for some reasons.
I was originally gonna buy a used record player. I nearly settled for the LUXMAN PD-300 only because of the name: Vacuum Suction Turntable



I have no idea what that does but the Luxman invented it in 1980 and I wanted it. Whatever it was it couldn't have been bad, with that name.
There are many of them in second hand shops so I was bound to find one sooner or later, but then by a chance I discovered that marble plinth TEAC and who wouldn't want a turntable made out of a fucking marble?

The only thing I dislike about it is that S tone arm. I always preferred them straight for some reason. But the marble outweighs any cons in this case. No pun intended.
Looking for a tape deck now. I really wanted to buy a small portable one, like the SONY TC D5:



but when I saw what they go for these days I immediately stopped wanting one.
Now on the short list are:

TEAC CX-211 (to match the turntable brand)


TASCAM 112 (it's the "pro" line of TEAC)


Technics RS-M10


NAD 6020


So long as it's black (lots of old cool looking decks were silver, which is a shame really) and comes with VU meters I'm down.