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Arcam Alpha would be fun. It's basically a beefed up UK built Philips player. Mine sounds fantastic.

Since I got back into vinyl surface noise bothered me to the point that I spent a small fortune on a Sugarcube. But some pops were so loud even that couldn't totally clean them up. I'd heard that pops and clicks could be made worse by a preamp with low headroom. I didn't truly appreciate how...

For a few years I was sceptical that headroom was important. Buying a Spartan 15 cured me of that pretty quickly.

@Michael Fidler Congratulations on another excellent preamp. I notice you have a Spartan 15 mk2 available now, what changes did you make?

Thanks! It's been a labor of love this last five years.

I really enjoyed the Spektor 2s but I didn't find them very detailed. Their biggest issue for your application is the 'phantom centre' isn't very cohesive. Vocals in the middle of the stereo field sounded a bit muddled. I upgraded to the Oberon 1s and found them to be far more resolving with...

I think you will be impressed.

Great review. I love these old players.

I have to do something similar with my Rega turntable.

I use a microlinear stylus on my Planar 1, which has no height adjustment. I've tried a few mats over the last couple of years, all varying in thickness. Currently I'm using the tallest (3mm cork) and I haven't heard any change in tonality vs the stock felt mat.

First impressions are that they aren't as bassy as the Spektor 2s. If anything a little bass shy but that's what I was hoping. Crispy top end, more upper mid bite than the Spektor. Also what I was hoping. They don't have quite the same lower mid range body which is something I'll have to...

What didn't you like about the Oberon 3? I've seen more than a few people say they prefer the Oberon 1.

I've used the Spektor 2s for almost four years and I'm going to try the Oberon 1s on Thursday. My hope is that they have a similar character but with a bit more clarity. My only criticism of the Spektor 2 is that the upper mids feel a bit distant. Beautiful sound otherwise though, and a steal...

Yeah I can do that. It'll take a couple of days but I'll record a few samples.

I get what you're saying. I understand that cutting edge DACs are irreproachable and that's the way I go when playing back needledrops. But when playing high quality recordings I find modern DACs too holographic and pristine, they sound subjectively artificial to my ears. I obviously have a...

I've noticed this too. Most musicians I've met are pretty clueless about recording quality but of course they do know their instruments.

This is something i've noticed. It's almost always the dots that are wobbly, not the platter. Even the models without dots have silver metal trim around the edge of the platter that can look wobbly. To be fair it shouldn't happen on a premium product like the Technics but I'm fairly certain...

I use the Wiim Mini with my A-S301. I even power it from the amp's USB, though using Pure Direct will cut the power. The A-S301's digital input supports up to 24 bit 192khz. The Wiim Mini can certainly downsample but I dunno about upsampling.

I've used my Sugarcube with various low headroom preamps and some pops and clicks are emphasized (distortion from preamp) to a point that the Sugarcube can't remove them cleanly. Using a Spartan 15 turned several of my 'must replace' records into keepers. I'm sure the Waxwing would benefit...