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Topic: My turntable sounds awful: no bass, very harsh (Read 47515 times) previous topic - next topic
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My turntable sounds awful: no bass, very harsh

Help!
im new to the hifi world and im having some very strange issues...i think.
my turntable sounds awful and im not sure why. there is no bass at all, and it sounds very harsh. almost unlistenable. When compared with a cd its evident that my amps and speakers sound great. is there any reason that it would sound so harsh? my current chain is as follows:

rega p2 ->
bellari vp130 ->
Manley Snapper mono blocks ->
Paradigm ref11

Am i missing something i need in my chain? im baffled....
i've just purchased all this stuff, and im trying to get it to work correctly! help!

My turntable sounds awful: no bass, very harsh

Reply #1 –
Once you are new to Hi Fi. Why don't you do the right thing?

Get rid of your turn table. It is obsolete.

The bad results you are getting are characteristics of a turn table. I use to have one. I got rid of it as soon as CDs appeared in the market.

My turntable sounds awful: no bass, very harsh

Reply #2 –
You should post this under "CD-R and Audio Hardware > Vinyl."

I can't help you with your issue but I sure would love to follow a thread like this with comments from those who can. I've been considering a turntable for limited usage and wouldn't mind knowing things about them.

Hopefully someone can help you find an answer to your problems who uses and appreciates vinyl. 
The Loudness War is over. Now it's a hopeless occupation.

My turntable sounds awful: no bass, very harsh

Reply #3 –
It seems you are not the only one to have had problems with this pre-amp: http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=1174395

It also seems that this piece of equipment is not highly regarded by people who know and use valve gear.

My turntable sounds awful: no bass, very harsh

Reply #4 –
@prs180 - Sounds like you've not got any RIAA eq being applied (try Google if that doesn't mean anything to you). You don't mention what cartridge your using and I am not familiar with your preamp but maybe it's switchable MM/MC and you might like to try both to see which sounds best. Or maybe it's faulty. Or maybe you just don't like it.

My turntable sounds awful: no bass, very harsh

Reply #5 –
There's many factors to be considered here.

The signal on a vinyl record are heavily processed to make up for the limitations of the medium. It has to be 're-processed' according to the RIAA standard to sound normal.

Different cartridges have different output levels. A moving coil cartridge needs more amplification than a moving magnet cartridge. Some RIAA amps compensate for this; some don't, and are thus only suitable for MM cartridges.

A turntable has to be set up correctly to sound decent. Any deviation from the ideal geometry will decrese sound quality.

Vinyl and mechanical music reproduction has its limitations compared to digital storage and reproduction: Narrower frequency range, less dynamic range, far more distortion and noise.

Despite what vinyl freaks claims, a vinyl recording will never sound as good as a good CD. Some CD versions of older recordings might sound 'flatter' than their vinyl counterparts, because they're mastered with less dynamics to suit radio and headphone playback. If the mastering is identical, the CD would sound better because of less distortion, less noise, and less limitations.

(Some people will always prefer a certain amount of distortion and noise to 'clean' sound though, as they find the duller sound 'warmer' and less 'fatiguing'.)

My turntable sounds awful: no bass, very harsh

Reply #6 –
To find out if it's the missing RIAA EQ in question, just plug the Bellari pre-amp output into your computer soundcard, record a sample and upload it to here (Uploads -sub forum).

Juha

My turntable sounds awful: no bass, very harsh

Reply #7 –
well, from what i've read it looks to be that the bellari is broken. Several people have had this same issue... thanks for the help! looks like its going back to the factory!

My turntable sounds awful: no bass, very harsh

Reply #8 –
It still amazes me just how often people with little or no experience or knowledge about vinyl think that they can just jump right in and have it all work. Maybe they are just used to how easy it is with digital media.

My turntable sounds awful: no bass, very harsh

Reply #9 –
Quote from: pdq on
It still amazes me just how often people with little or no experience or knowledge about vinyl think that they can just jump right in and have it all work. Maybe they are just used to how easy it is with digital media.



Any piece of equipment can fail. CDPs break too. Sounds like bad luck with the preamp. Nothing more nothing less. You don't need experience to buy vinyl playback equipment and have it work as designed right out of the box. Other than setting up the TT/arm and cartridge (which can usually be done for you if you buy retail) there isn't much to know. *Most* TTs are pretty easy to operate.

My turntable sounds awful: no bass, very harsh

Reply #10 –
Quote from: analog scott on
Quote from: pdq on
It still amazes me just how often people with little or no experience or knowledge about vinyl think that they can just jump right in and have it all work. Maybe they are just used to how easy it is with digital media.


You don't need experience to buy vinyl playback equipment and have it work as designed right out of the box. Other than setting up the TT/arm and cartridge (which can usually be done for you if you buy retail) there isn't much to know.


Let me complete this statement:  You don't need experience to buy vinyl playback equipment and have it work as designed right out of the box except for selecting it which we see people mess up all the time, and setting it up which very few people, even technicans who work for the dealer and charge you a mint for their services, are likely to do right.

My turntable sounds awful: no bass, very harsh

Reply #11 –
Quote from: Arnold B. Krueger on
Quote from: analog scott on
Quote from: pdq on
It still amazes me just how often people with little or no experience or knowledge about vinyl think that they can just jump right in and have it all work. Maybe they are just used to how easy it is with digital media.


You don't need experience to buy vinyl playback equipment and have it work as designed right out of the box. Other than setting up the TT/arm and cartridge (which can usually be done for you if you buy retail) there isn't much to know.


Let me complete this statement:  You don't need experience to buy vinyl playback equipment and have it work as designed right out of the box except for selecting it which we see people mess up all the time, and setting it up which very few people, even technicans who work for the dealer and charge you a mint for their services, are likely to do right.



I agree that set up is not something for a novice. but even that is to a large degree very equipment dependent. An SME V is really easy. My Forsell arm....is for a surgeon or some one with similar hand/eye coordination. Before I started doing it myself I was never charged for set up much less charged a mint. It was included with the purchase of my cartridge. I am glad I cut my teeth on the SME V though.

As for messing up the selection... Ultimately that is determined by buyer satisfaction really.

A skilled and knowledgable dealer is very valuable for someone new to vinyl IMO.

My turntable sounds awful: no bass, very harsh

Reply #12 –
Let me get this straight; vinyl used to be the common standard in ordinary people's homes before it was usurped by CD, and now suddenly it's very hard to set up?

What am I missing from this picture?

My turntable sounds awful: no bass, very harsh

Reply #13 –
Quote from: dhromed on
Let me get this straight; vinyl used to be the common standard in ordinary people's homes before it was usurped by CD, and now suddenly it's very hard to set up?

What am I missing from this picture?

That, back in the vinyl heydays there were advanced turntables for those who wanted decent sound quality, and simple turntables for those who didn't care for sound quality. SQ in most homes were beyond lousy.

Today, people who wants to play vinyl wants sound quality that can compare to CD. This means they'll have to get a decent turntable and set it up properly.

The CD meant that, for the first time, decent sound quailty was available for other than the few who were willing to spend time and money on equipment and tweaks. Most people today don't realize this.

My turntable sounds awful: no bass, very harsh

Reply #14 –
Quote from: dhromed on
Let me get this straight; vinyl used to be the common standard in ordinary people's homes before it was usurped by CD, and now suddenly it's very hard to set up?

What am I missing from this picture?

What has changed is that the CD has raised the bar. It used to be that the average turntable and cartridge with average adjustments produced sound quality that the average listener was happy with. Now it is trivial for the average listener to pop a CD into any old CD player and get sound that is audibly superior to what he was used to listening to.

OTOH, the vinyl fanatic still gets about the same quality he got in the old days, which is at best imperceptibly lower quality than a CD with the same mastering, but at the expense of time, effort and money.

My turntable sounds awful: no bass, very harsh

Reply #15 –
Quote from: dhromed on
Let me get this straight; vinyl used to be the common standard in ordinary people's homes before it was usurped by CD, and now suddenly it's very hard to set up?


No, vinyl was always very hard to set up *right* in many cases.

Quote
What am I missing from this picture?


A historical perspective?  Up until I was in my mid-30s, vinyl was all we had.  I set up my first high quality audio syytem when I was 13 and learned about  the pitfalls of setting up vinyl in the school of hard knocks. For about 5 years I worked in a stereo shop and set up more turntables and record changers than I can possibly remember.

My turntable sounds awful: no bass, very harsh

Reply #16 –
Quote from: dhromed on
Let me get this straight; vinyl used to be the common standard in ordinary people's homes before it was usurped by CD, and now suddenly it's very hard to set up?

What am I missing from this picture?


Back in the day the common standard in ordinary people's home was a turntable with a ceramic cartridge that was built in and hard wired to the rest of the playback system.  There was no opportunity to hook it up wrong.  The only adjustments to worry about were choosing the speed (33/45/78) and maybe flipping the stylus lever between LP and 78.


My turntable sounds awful: no bass, very harsh

Reply #17 –
That clears it up.
I grew up around early CD. I only used vinyl as a small boy, playing with me mum's records, so the idea that there was a distinction between common vinyl setups and advanced ones never occurred to me. By the time I began acquiring audio, everybody used CDs. Well, and cassette tape.

My turntable sounds awful: no bass, very harsh

Reply #18 –
Quote from: pdq on
OTOH, the vinyl fanatic still gets about the same quality he got in the old days, which is at best imperceptibly lower quality than a CD with the same mastering, but at the expense of time, effort and money.


The vinyl fanatic often claims that vinyl is superior to CD, because 'analog recordings are inherently superior to digital recordings.'  You can easily debunk this misconception by digitizing a vinyl recording with some decent gear.  The digitized version might be impossible to distinguish from the vinyl source.

My turntable sounds awful: no bass, very harsh

Reply #19 –
Quote from: DonP on
Quote from: dhromed on
Let me get this straight; vinyl used to be the common standard in ordinary people's homes before it was usurped by CD, and now suddenly it's very hard to set up?

What am I missing from this picture?


Back in the day the common standard in ordinary people's home was a turntable with a ceramic cartridge that was built in and hard wired to the rest of the playback system.  There was no opportunity to hook it up wrong.  The only adjustments to worry about were choosing the speed (33/45/78) and maybe flipping the stylus lever between LP and 78.


A playback system with a ceramic cartridge might have been midway up-scale. The common LP player had a crystal cartridge. The typical turntable was actually a changer with an undersized stamped metal or plastic turntable and a 2-pole motor. The rumble would have been pretty horrendous except the speakers used couldn't reproduce it, and the power amp wouldn't even try. The tone arm was plastic and used a spring to counterbalance the weight. No anti-skating to say the least and the arm was often undersized so that tracking error would be high. Modern $100 USB turntables are prtty high tech in comparison.

IME perhaps 3% or less of the general public had a turntable with a magnetic cartridge, at least prior toe Vietnam war where a lot of upscale equipment sales in PXs raised the general public's consciousness.

My turntable sounds awful: no bass, very harsh

Reply #20 –
Quote from: DonP on
Quote from: dhromed on
Let me get this straight; vinyl used to be the common standard in ordinary people's homes before it was usurped by CD, and now suddenly it's very hard to set up?

What am I missing from this picture?


Back in the day the common standard in ordinary people's home was a turntable with a ceramic cartridge that was built in and hard wired to the rest of the playback system.  There was no opportunity to hook it up wrong.  The only adjustments to worry about were choosing the speed (33/45/78) and maybe flipping the stylus lever between LP and 78.



Yup.  Here's one that a bit more modern looking than the one my parents had in the 1970s

My turntable sounds awful: no bass, very harsh

Reply #21 –
Quote from: krabapple on
Quote from: DonP on
Quote from: dhromed on
Let me get this straight; vinyl used to be the common standard in ordinary people's homes before it was usurped by CD, and now suddenly it's very hard to set up?

What am I missing from this picture?


Back in the day the common standard in ordinary people's home was a turntable with a ceramic cartridge that was built in and hard wired to the rest of the playback system.  There was no opportunity to hook it up wrong.  The only adjustments to worry about were choosing the speed (33/45/78) and maybe flipping the stylus lever between LP and 78.



Yup.  Here's one that a bit more modern looking than the one my parents had in the 1970s




If its a Zenith then it is almost identical to the "brown goods" "stereo" that graced my in-law's living room. The record player looks like a VM (Voice of Music)  changer that was stamped out in the zillions in Benton Harbor Michigan, crystal crtridge,  2-pole motor with plastic arm that tracked at 6-8 grams. You could buy them for $19.95 or less in the better-stocked electronics stores. In comparison a top-of-the-line Garrard changer with low end Shure magnetic cartridge might still run under $100.

My turntable sounds awful: no bass, very harsh

Reply #22 –
That looks just like the "hi-fi" that used to reside in my grandparents' living room! That thing sounded like stir-fried crap no matter what the source was  They made those in Benton Harbor? That makes it all so clear.    (About 18 years ago I had the distinct misfortune of visiting that place whilst abetting the fleeing of a local friend/felon. ...a story for a different forum I suppose.)

I used to have some vinyl when I was a kid. The trend was one kid would buy a "Master of Puppets" upon its release and the rest of us would all get a cassette copy. (Take that, Metallica.) Tape-trading was the thing back then. It was just more convenient than properly setting up turntables or whatever...

...which brings me (finally) to my point: I've been seriously considering rediscovering vinyl in limited ways. Reading some of the comments by all of you (who have far more technical knowledge on the subject) I find myself discouraged. It seems to be way too much of a pain in the arse to even bother with. I like my CDs and FLACs well enough, but if I don't mess with a turntable soon I may just die with regrets or something. IDK
The Loudness War is over. Now it's a hopeless occupation.

My turntable sounds awful: no bass, very harsh

Reply #23 –
Still, vinyl beat the crap, at least in convenience terms, out of having to sharpen needles and only getting 3' a side.

My turntable sounds awful: no bass, very harsh

Reply #24 –
Quote from: Engelsstaub on
I've been seriously considering rediscovering vinyl in limited ways. Reading some of the comments by all of you (who have far more technical knowledge on the subject) I find myself discouraged. It seems to be way too much of a pain in the arse to even bother with. I like my CDs and FLACs well enough, but if I don't mess with a turntable soon I may just die with regrets or something. IDK

I went down a similar road earlier this year - putting together a basic turntable rig for "ripping" some vinyl-only releases I had picked up over the years, and also just for seeing what all the fuss was about.

My conclusion:  stick to your CDs and FLACs and die happy.

Way more trouble than it's worth, and even when I would put on a record and think, "Wow, this actually sounds really good," playing back a LAME-encoded MP3 from the CD of the same album via iTunes always sounded much better:  no noise or distortion, and flat frequency response - yay!

(To say nothing of the colossal PITA of digitzing - in real time! - and then normalizing, track splitting, tagging...ugh.  The big artwork is definitely cool, though.)
"Not sure what the question is, but the answer is probably no."