I'm happy to see some of these classic manufacturers getting back to their roots. Marantz, Technics, and Yamaha all come to mind.
Audio Pr0n
I Didn't Want To, But I Had To
It turns out I was unable to fully resuscitate my old CD player after all. Cleaning—and later lubricating—the rail on which the laser sled rides helped for a while, but then disks started skipping or stopping or simply refusing to play past a certain point again. I was bummed out, especially since I really liked the aesthetics of that old 90's deck.
Finding a new player for under $1200 these days is kind of daunting since the medium is has been declared dead by most manufacturers in the wake of digital files and streaming, so I was fortunate to find this Yamaha (CD-S303) at a very reasonable price that met my needs. It's nothing special to look at, but it does what it's supposed to. And with my aging ears, I'm well past my audiophile days anyway so if this sounds any different with its newer DACs and whatnot than my old unit did, I'll never know. It plays disks without randomly stopping or skipping and that's what's important at this point. So I have no complaints. (It just played all the way through Abbacadabra's Abbasalute—currently making my way through Pet Shop Boys Very/Relentless—without so much as a single hiccup; something the old deck couldn't do no matter how many invocations to the Dark Forces I uttered.)
And before you ask—yes, we do have a newish Blueray DVD player that also plays music CDs. But like all of them on the market today, it has no display and I don't know about you, but I don't want to have the television on just to navigate the disk. And because we watch so little from physical media these days, it's not even hooked up.
What a Beauty!
Same model I have, but this one looks to be in even better condition!
Vinyl Nerd Talk
The last phono cartridge I bought with my own money was a Shure M97xE for $60 back in 2005. (It's still available, but now selling for around $500. Don't ask me why.) It replaced the Ortofon Nightclub S (no longer available) that I'd been spinning with since getting back into vinyl in 1997. I was amazed at how much better the Shure sounded; probably because it had a brand new, unworn stylus and was a "Hi-Fi" cartridge designed for home use, and not a "DJ" cartridge as was the Ortofon.
Several years later I received a gift cartridge from my friend John (yes, the same John that supplied me with that connector back in July) that he'd pulled from the stockpiles of equipment he'd inherited from our mutual friend Joel, owner of The Turntable Factory, who'd passed away in 2007.
Among them was a Shure V-15 Type IV, a legendary piece of kit from back in the late 70s. John admitted it wasn't new, but assured me it there was very low mileage on the stylus. I gave it a spin, and I loved it. It became my daily driver for many years (probably way more than it should have), but I rationalized its continued use by saying I really wasn't playing that much vinyl, thereby keeping the stylus wear to a minimum. That is, until the day arrived that I had to admit it was quite overdue for replacement.
Shure was obviously no longer making stylii for what was then a 35 year old cartridge, and even if they had been, I wasn't swimming in cash at the time, making even the third-party after-market replacements that were available prohibitively expensive. (I told you this had been a good cartridge.)
After discussing this with John and admitting I didn't have a clue what to replace it with (and after living with it for several years I couldn't easily return to the M97—which also needed a new stylus at that point—John told me not to sweat it; he had others in his inventory he would gladly send me.
The next care package to arrive (back in 2015 or thereabouts) contained an Ortofon OM 5E. The sound was okay. I mean, I was in a vinyl lull, not buying much anyway and the sound was definitely better than the worn Type IV, so I got used to it. When it came time earlier this year to replace its stylus and I was faced with the same dilemma of keeping and replacing the cartridge or replacing the whole thing with something else, John came through with another new OM as well as a spare stylus.
Admittedly, the new stylus made a world of difference, and was happy with the sound…until.
Until I got the new loudspeakers in August.
The sound I got from the OM was good enough for my old Infinitys, but the new JBLs are unforgiving, pointing out that the OM was just lacking. Lacking in what I couldn't exactly say. Even keeping in mind my severely limited high frequency hearing, the sound just seemed dull. (Getting old is a bitch. I don't recommend it.)
So I got off my ass and started doing research. I'd heard the Orofon 2M Red was good (after all it's what Technics is pre-mounting on their new 1500C turntable), but after reading reviews and watching more YouTube videos than I care to admit, I decided to take it up a notch and ordered an Ortofon 2M Blue.
It arrived today.
After having spent only about two hours with it so far, I'm absolutely blown away. I wasn't expecting much—the reason I bought it from Amazon, ensuring an easy return if I decided it wasn't worth it—but it's exactly as good as everyone described. And it hasn't even broken in yet! Even with my old-age hearing loss, it's like I've been running around with cotton in my ears all these years. From a brand new pressing of Dave Brubeck's Take Five to a 40 year old copy of Fern Kinney's Groove Me, the sound is phenomenal.
Audio Pr0n
I wanted the top one (the 360) in the worst way, but sadly a cassette deck was not in my budget until a decade later and this model had been long since discontinued.
Vintage Audio Pr0n
Vintage Audio Porn
Kenwood made some beautiful stuff back in the day.
Reconnecting With An Old Friend
Yes, I write about stupid stuff on this blog; just like I used to do with my Journals back in the 90s. The only difference is you're not going to hear tales of wanton abandon at the west end of Golden Gate Park.
In this age of headphone jack scarcity and Bluetooth everythingness, it might seem strange that—after having adopted that mindset myself for the past several years—on a whim I sought out to replace my once-favorite pair of wired headphones after coming across the empty packaging they came in a couple weeks ago.
But I did.
I'm not a fan of the standard earbuds that come with Apple's iPhones, although I will admit the sound quality seems to have gotten better over the years. (They usually stay in the box, unused and unopened, until the phone is resold, but I pulled out the latest iteration a few weeks ago and was pleasantly surprised at how much better they seem to have gotten.) My biggest beef with them remains—and why I have no desire to buy the wireless Earpods—is the complete lack of any sort of seal against outside noise. (This makes them impossible to use in my local Starbucks, where it now seems to have become the norm to have the music at discotheque volume ALL THE TIME—an issue I've reported to corporate on more than one occasion with a friendly "we're sorry, here's x-dollar credit on your Starbucks Card" response.)
I discovered Apple's in-ear headphones back in 2013. I remember Ben and I making a right-before-closing trek to the Aspen Grove store because I'd reached the end of my rope with the Earcandy (or whatever brand it had been at the time) I'd been using and wanted more for my daily commute to and from Hell, otherwise known as DISH Corporate Headquartrers.
In my opinion, these were the best wired earbuds I'd ever owned. I was devastated when they finally died. I could have replaced them, but I'd gotten Ben a wireless pair of Jaybird Bluetooth headphones and was so impressed with the sound that I paid twice as much as I would have for the replacement to get a pair.
I still have those Jaybirds, and have in fact, replaced those with another pair of Jaybirds that I've been using without complaint for about a year or so. (Did you know it's actually possible to force your Mac to use the best codec possible when listening through Bluetooth? I didn't prior to last week.)
Anyhow, the last time I saw these Apple in-ear phones was at an Apple store about a year ago. Even though I was perfectly happy with my Jaybirds, I was sorely tempted to pick up another pair, because I knew with Apple's elimination of the headphone jack it was only a matter of time before they disappeared from the shelves.
While chatting with my friend John after finding the headphones' old packaging, the subject of these headphones came up, and—feeling a bit nostalgic—on a lark I went to the Apple website to see if they were still available. They weren't.
But they were still available from other retailers—and for $30 off their original price.
They arrived a week ago, and I love them as much as ever. Unlike the Jaybirds, where I've always struggled (on both pairs owned) to get a good seal in my ear canal, the Apple phones fit perfectly and block out almost all outside sound.
Admittedly they aren't quite as bright as the Jaybirds, but I can live with it, the difference being so slight to these old ears it really doesn't matter.
Sexy AF
So apparently Technics released some new turntables yesterday. First up—unlike the megabucks decks of the last couple years billed as successors to the iconic 1200mk2—was the 1200mk7.
Visually (except for it's brand-new all black color) it looks to be the direct descendant of the legendary 1200mk2 line—almost to the point they located the original manufacturing dies. A closer look of course reveals more than a few not-so-subtle differences: a new tonearm, new motor, and new electronics. Pretty much everything has been updated for the 21st century while retaining the same iconic look.
No pricing announced yet, but everything seems to point to less than $1K, which would put it on equal footing with what much-desired used 1200s have been going for on eBay.
More than anything it looks like perhaps Panasonic has actually been listening to their customers who were unimpressed with the wholesale revisions—and astronomical price tags—of what they had earlier released as replacements for the 1200. Did this news make me want to give up my venerable 1300mk2 and run out and buy one?
Not exactly.
But this…
OMFG. When I first saw it I swear I had a spontaneous ejaculation.
Sexy. As. Fuck.
Most definitely not a DJ deck, the sl1500c is a fresh take on their wonderful direct drive home turntables of years long past. While the 1500 moniker implies a completely manual deck, this one lifts the arm and shuts off at the end of the record (more like their old 1400 series machines), but I'm not going to quibble. It has no pitch controls, but other than that seems to boast the same guts as the new 1200s. And the aesthetic? TOTALLY Technics.
I sure don't need one, but I definitely want one. And the 1500 is available in silver.
Could this actually mark the rebirth of the Technics brand?
Unobtainium
Okay, I hate to have to enlist my army of readers yet again, but maybe one of you owned the US version of the Technics SU-C01 preamp back in the day and have this little beauty squirreled away in a box somewhere. It's a proprietary (although strictly speaking not required) connector cord for the C01 micro series components that came out in 1979. Sure, you can connect the tuner to the pre-amp to the amplifier with regular RCA cords, but this was always a much more elegant solution.
I found one source online that had the part listed (SPJ9401), but when I actually went to order, it came back as discontinued. I just missed out on not one, but two Yahoo Japan auctions for the thing, so I'm hoping I can locate one somewhere else. Maybe one of my thousands of readers?
I sold my previous set of C01s (with the connector) ten years ago to a friend back east, and he thinks he still has the part and is willing to sell it back to me, but he recently moved and is occupied with more pressing tasks than rummaging through boxes to locate it. Interestingly, before shipping the components to him I thought about keeping the cord just in case I ever got another set because I knew it would next to impossible to replace, but ultimately decided to pass it on.
Anyone Have A Spare $6995 Laying Around
…that they'd like to give me?
