Assembler Vinyl collectors: What are you collecting?

I think most direct drive turntables are DJcentric.

 

Thanks for the chart Ave - you know I never really looked into what decks I had, I just figured they made one SL1200/1210, etc... So, 12 years later I've just figured out of I've got two 1200MK2... One was given to me, the other was £200 on eBay around the same time. Looks like I got lucky! They're just for fun and sadly mostly covered in dust except for a handful of times a year.

 

My New York trip didn't happen, But I'm looking on Ebay for some goodies. Looking for Jazz, Afro Cuban, A decent copy of Pink Floyd's Animals and anything else I may stumble on.

 

Belt drives last forever too lol I set up a Tosh SRA something or other for a friend who found it in his families loft, hasn't been used in 20-odd years and has the original belt on it. No signs of brittleness and the excellent Android App "RPM Calculator" showed it was running at a nice 33.3 and occassionally .4 RPM. The needle was my concern but it passed the eye test and played some shite he had laying around, under advise he should probably replace the cartridge since I have no idea what was on it!

He's my recent pick ups. First picture is last friday, from a record store in Leeds, and the bottom is from the vinyl fair the day after.


Order of symmetry > Crowded House Self Titlted > KMFDM "Sucks" single > John Coltrane's "Ballads"> The gerbils "are you sleepy"
(fun fact: are you sleepy? the bottom album is extremely scarce. one pressing and 750 total, and I got it for a loooooow price.)

 

KMFDM on VInyl EPIC SAUCE

I have 3 albums coming in the next week or so.

 

where dem new albums at GoH?

I have an order on its way to me (passed customs and en route) for 28 Pop Punk LP's. A mix of 7" a 10" I think and 12" LP's. Will post pics when they show up!

 

They're on the way, the first of the three arrived today, an absolute legendary jazz album from one of the great trumpet players.

 

Miles Davie The Complete Birth of the Cool- a 70s Pressing of CLASSIC Miles Davis. Very Swingy.

Oliver Nelson The Blues and the Abstract Truth- This Spanish reissue of an album I didn't hear about until a German VC member mentioned it on You Tube. Such a smooth and pure sound coming off this one. I'm giving it a spin right now as I type this. The Label this is on is controversial among some collectors as there is a conspiracy theory that they use CDs to master these albums. I think it's unfounded as their albums sound the best of all the jazz stuff I have.

Horace Silver Blowin the Blues away- SURFACE NOISE OH DEAR GOD DOES THIS HAVE TERRIBLE SURFACE NOISE. But what can I expect from a 56 year old album. It's amazing it even still plays. This is just pure Hard Bop and tuning out said surface noise is an amazing listen. I'll have to keep an eye out for either a reissue or a copy in better shape. This is however my first from it's era Blue note Album.

 

It's nice toto see your collection growing, GOH. what player are you using these days? Did you buy the Audio-Technica player? Good players they are for the price.

 

Yeah I did get the Audio Technica. Wonderful player. I think I'm going to upgrade the stylus in a few months and get a better surface mat.

 

Yeah, a stylus upgrade is a good idea but I think the mat the comes with it is fine. It pretty thick. As I said, for the price the Audio-Technica player is very good. I sold mine and now have the direct Drive Technics. There is a difference in quality, especially in the higher frequency range but it's not really noticeable unless you are using headphones. The quite sections on a record are much quieter though. That's a big difference. When you do upgrade and have a bit more cash I do recommend a direct Drive table.

 

Yeah I plan on getting a Direct Drive table down the line. I also need to get better speakers/receiver too. My turntable is going in through an AUX port, So I don't think I'm getting optimal sound.

 

Some really awesome stuff you guys have!! Very cool to see people still have their own style, taste ,and desires when it comes to collecting music.
I'm a semi retired vinyl collector I guess you would say,, sadly I had to end up treating it more like an addiction then a hobby and limiting my self to reasonable servings,not to mention in recent years money has of course been an issue so I really only buy atomosphere/rhymesayers and NIN stuff. (odd combo of favs i know)
My overall collection covers most everything, many of these were bought many eons ago (some even decades ago) long before time encoded vinyl (Serato etc) was even thought of and our only options were crude samplers and of course forced us to lug crates of stuff around should we ever want to go anywhere or play out at bars, clubs etc. Dj's these days are outstanding,, but nothing beats flipping true vinyl to create an amazing live piece
Here are a few pics of one of my shelves and some favorites

Still can't find them all, but here's some NIN

Spoiler

(some) Atmosphere stuff ..... sorting this is looking worse and worse LOL!

Spoiler

Some comedy classics and Weird Al Oh and yes that's a care bears picture vinyl LOL

Spoiler

Since both Sublime 40oz and picture discs/colored vinyl have been mentioned in this thread I pulled these out,, the 40oz is glow in the dark, and the white zombie was to cool to pass up,, however it is the worst sounding vinyl I have!!! (I have 78's that sound better than it!!)

Spoiler

More here, http://s1148.photobucket.com/user/begallegal1/library/Vinyl stuff
and will likely add more pics to that album as I sort this mess out

Keep collecting guys, great stuff !!
begal

 

Is it true that all picture discs sound awful? Most of the ones I've listened to don't sound good at all.

 

for the most part yes, at least for music anyway, some things are tolerable but generally speaking far from that nice evenly spread, very rich tone that most vinyl connoisseurs desire. That being said I have heard some interview and dialog type picture vinyl that sounded ok, but a couple voices is a pretty small frequency range to reproduce on small shallow grooves, more complex and extended ranges of frequency required for almost all music types just does not reproduce well on picture vinyl.

Regarding the terrible white zombie astro creep "blood splatter" vinyl , it's honestly so bad you can hear a distinct tone change every time it passes between sections of clear and red (which is almost constant for the first couple tracks on each side,pic will show you what I mean)
I have never really had any issues with purely colored vinyl regardless if it was "heavyweight" or "lightweight" ,, but this one was purely made for looks, nothing desirable to the vinyl connoisseur who wants to enjoy their piece between their favorite platter and diamond

 

Begallegal1, you seem to know quite a bit about vinyl and certainly have an impressive collection. I've always been in to quality audio but only recently been able to get in to vinyl again (I had a crap load back in the UK when I was in my mid to late teens). Recently I picked up a Technics SL 1300 with a Sony XL50 pick up. After a good clean and service it is sounding very nice. But I have a question about the stylus position.

The Sony XL50 head can have the stylus moved backwards and forwards. I found the keeping it in the middle of the head produced the best sound but that could be due to the setting of the counter weight on the arm (took a bloody age to get that perfect).
What I'd like the know is if there's an ideal position for the stylus to be in in regards to the head? Should it be centered, all the way to the front or all the way to the back?

 

Yes your setup being in the middle is the usual setup for most all adjustable types. As you said of yours and in general it will produce the fullest tone while still allowing for some degree of adjustment of the counterweight for various playing conditions / vinyl types. Really the more important point is the alignment,,there is a ton of information and tools for almost every configuration or theory here http://www.vinylengine.com/tools.shtml
which can become hugely in depth and tedious,, this brings up the age old discussion between many purists of why they believe linear tracking turntables will beat a fixed arm table in every way. The science and logic in this is easy enough to see, and I personally agree 100% that a linear table is the way to go, however not all linear tables are good ones! Sadly once the idea caught on, like anything that is mass marketed some companies started producing very cheap versions that really did not perform well in various ways. I believe this gave them a bad rap to the average consumer and since then the majority of turntables produced for the consumer market have been fixed arm.

although there are far fewer out there as opposed to standard horizontal style linear tables, I really like the vertical standing models like this one http://www.ebay.com/itm/MGA-MITSUBI...-LINEAR-TRACKING-TURNTABLE-H667-/351575960293

It's funny considering it from a preservation standpoint more so now , we destroyed so many records back in the day, cutting on the same break for ages sometimes LOL!!! ahh the memories,, and the many many duplicates I have with sections of burned off grooves

funny dig of the day while sorting some of this,cereal box records anybody else old enough to remember cutting these?? LOL !!!

Spoiler

 

Cheers for all the info. Funny you should post the vertical turn table as I was eyeing up a Sharp one which opened like a tape deck! So cool but I believe they sounded like crap so I passed in it.

Is that Jackson disc a flexy disc? I had a few of them in the UK. They'd come on magazine covers sometimes I remember having to put a coin on to them so that they wouldn't slip

 

I need some NIN and Sublime on Vinyl. The Fragile is a holy grail of mine. Sublime albums on Vinyl show up every so often on Ebay. 40oz was my last 3 years of High School.

 

yup , a decent cardboard back on that one, as you mentioned of magazines they came in/on various things ,was really a pretty genius marketing tool of the day, also suiting a dual purpose in wiping out a large number of childrens "fisher price" turntables sylus im sure LOL

+2 to that, one of my top 10 albums as well, but that being said its battling rank with at least half of those being other Halo's

Dig out of the day,,, Flash a-ah......

Spoiler

LOL