Went to visit my brother last week and saw my old PLX-1000 that now belongs to him, he's still enjoying it a lot:
Great long lasting decks. I sold mine after a few years of regular use, still worked and looked like new Not all stuff coming from China is total garbage nowadays!
Well...you don't get that a turntable with instructions for the tonearm to be horizontal, and an adjustment range of 6 mm—and the manual indicates my 19 mm cartridge is within that range—is about 4 mm outside that range? That's not a micron, that's about 4000 of them. And if so, why did Pioneer supply the adjustment and instructions? Would this give you a warm fuzzy feeling about the quality of the product? Much less after two rounds of replacing the guts. Anyway, you missed my point about the service department. Number one, I was looking for an indication this was actually adjustable by a service center. This would be my third double round trip to drop off and pick up, and not worth it if it's simply a flaw in the turntable and can't be addressed. If it could be addressed, this would be my only shot at it under warranty, should it be a symptom of other problems I might not find for a month otherwise. I was looking for a simple answer, and was clear about it. Instead, I had days of trying to get that answered, with insinuations that I was either doing something wrong, or was having unrealistic expectations that Pioneer's claims were true and that the tracking probably didn't matter anyway. I didn't post this because I'm at wit's end and don't know what to do—I said I already bought another mat, I don't need to pay someone $500 to do that. I posted this because I thought some would like to know what they could be getting into. 106 page thread, I suppose some find this when they are considering the product.
You might want to investigate headshell spacers too. I have to use a double mat and a headshell spacer to get a useful VTA range. I realize that you're probably pretty frustrated at this point, and might be thinking that you shouldn't have to jump through all these hoops to get the table play properly, and you might be right. But I can also tell you that once you do jump through all those hoops the Pioneer can indeed play nicely. You're almost there.
Thanks, I appreciate your comments and the fact it's working fine for a lot of people. I do actually like the turntable a lot, so I hope I don't sound too frustrated. The repair cycle was unexpected, but I don't get too bent out of shape about it, just hoping that was it. After all, the turntable was fine when I got it, and basically died while not being used. So if it's good from here on out, I have a good turntable, and if not, I guess I'll be shopping for one again.
I feel like the “not low enough” thing is talked about in every forum I’ve ever seen about these or the 1200’s and the same solution seems to work for everyone. Use a mat. I use a 5mm Herbies Mat instead of the stock mat and it allows me to make all adjustments for any cart I use. Fun table.
Don't know about a mark 7. But I can confirm that I have here a Rega mount for an old school Technics 1200/1210 and having investigated whether that'll fit the PLX - unfortunately it won't, as the 3 bolt holes on it don't match the PLX. I did think about drilling the mount to match the PLX, but iirc at least one of them partially overlaps and so without a bench drill it'd be very messy. So I think that means that an old school Technics arm wouldn't mount to a PLX.
Its probably worth adding that my suggestion of needing a bench drill is a reflection of my poor diy skills. If you were better than me - you could well drill the necessary holes np and I'd think then use a black washer to cover the oversized hole(s) to address the cosmetics. I didn't pay a lot for the mount - iirc was c£20-£30 on eBay and is a good quality steel painted black so would blend well on the PLX. Hey maybe I'll persuade myself to give it a go in the future - won't be soon though - too much other things on the list.
Is the top plate on the PLX aluminum or plastic? And is it a separate piece from the top portion of the chassis (if that makes sense)? I see a crack or gap all the way around between the top part of the sides and the top plate and just wonder what it's all made of and how it bolts together. Is it a brushed plate inserted into a die cast top chassis? A single piece with machined gap? I'm thinking about buying one of these but don't know what it's made of.
I understand that the bottom part of the chassis is ABS plastic or something like that. What I'm talking about is whether the top metal part is one piece or two piece. There's a gap all the way around between a flat brushed top plate and the top part of the sides. I'm wondering if the top plate is an insert or part of a single top piece with the gap machined into it.