Rec needed: light for grading records and above turntable

I am looking for a good gooseneck type lamp to place above my turntable to see where the next tracks or to test out "trouble" areas on the vinyl. My room is so dark having only the lights in a ceiling fan so I want to place a small footprint lamp above my turntable. I don't have a bnc connecter so those are out.

Secondly, what type of lighting do you use for visually grading records? I find that bright tube flourescents like you'd find in an office work pretty good. I am looking at getting one of the flourescent lamp/maginfying glass combos.

 

I am looking for the same thing - I looked at Ikea and they have some very basic halogen office/desk lights with a goose neck for around $10.

I use sunlight and halogen lights when looking closely at a record for damage or whatever but I am a novice in this regard and am hoping for a more informed opinion wrt light sources for record inspection.

 

halogen all the way....got a lamp at Home depot for $50 with adjustable light! Works great for me....need to dim!


sean

 

I recommend LED. Great light to see lps and no heat. Less than halogen as well.

 

I haven't thought about halogen, mainly due to the heat factor but I will check those out. I have never been able to use sunlight for looking at records, I don't know why but flourescent light seems to show the scratches best, especially when held at an angle. I even sometimes use a handlens (10x mag) to see if the scratch cuts very deep into the groove.

 

Direct Sunlight will show all the visual flaws in a record. TT for everything else i.e., warps, off-center and the dreaded lip warble.

 

http://www.sunnexonline.com/tasklights/ultimate-reader.htm

I use this and it rocks

 

Your Technics doesn't have that little light on it? That helps me a lot as far as finding a track on vinyl.

Frank R.

 

Parts express has magnefied workbench lamps that work great for this application.

http://www.parts-express.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?Partnumber=350-010

 

Its blue and way too dark, it's a 1210.

 

I use one of these, two intensity/brightness settings, aesthetically unique and fully adjustable.

 

I used a Littlite by my Nakamichi turntable for a long time, just so I could check the stylus and set down the tonearm. I was careful to keep the power supply a long way away from the phono leads, just to ward against hum and noise.

The Littlites are extremely popular in edit bays, video mastering rooms, and audio mixing rooms, because they're small, bright, and don't get in the way. Not cheap, though.