What's the speed of your turntable?

WOW! You must have the best pitch perception of anyone on the whole forum. 33.30 is 0.9991 of 33.33. That is 9 parts in 10,000. That is hearing beyond all human belief.

 

True, a listener accustomed to a slight elevation in pitch and tempo, will need to adjust to actual pitch and tempo. The music will be perceived as sluggish and less bright. The adjustment may take a few hours or maybe a few weeks, but will eventually happen. Only a slight change in pitch can have significant psycho-acoustical effects. In fact in the glory days of AM radio, all the stations pitched up the music for mostly one reason. More hit songs and commercials could be squeezed into an hour long play-list. Current Hit radio was fast paced. Factor in also the voice over intros and fade outs. The higher pitch (faster tempo) also had a side effect of perceived brightness and a more youthful energy to the music.. more so than intended by the sound engineers who produced the records. Pitch manipulation was also practiced by the sound engineers in the studio, especially beneficial for female singers.

As for turntable speed accuracy, any pitch deviation will affect the timbre of instruments, the perceived pace (tempo) and energy of the music. Just 1% is a lot, and very audible. Voice is equally affected. Any pitch deviation can be considered distortion of the original source.

 

I bought a Lenco L75 out of a garage for $120. First time I plugged it in, it ran right at 33.33 under Turntabulation. Fire up the 43-year old table and Boom! Right on the mark. Hey, they're just fancy motors.

 

For $10, you could get this and always know how fast your table is spinning while listening to actual music, not test tones, in real time, all the time...
No worrying if your last session of dialing it in still holds. About half the price of a Feickert test record.

Before you say you do not have enough clearance, try these magnets here if you can part with $.20, maybe splurge and buy 5 of them for a dollar!
They are 1/32" thick and strong enough to trigger the hall sensor.

I realize it diminishes the propeller-head, laboratory scientist vibe some folks are going for and simply tells you how fast your table is spinning, that's a trade-off you have to make.

Or, for $87 you can get a pretty serious one that will handle 4 magnets, goes out 4-digits beyond the decimal point...

Heck, you can go back to using your smartphone to talk to other humans with... nah, just kidding.

 

Hardly. Try it yourself on a recording you know like the back of your hand.

 

One thing about Rega TT's. It seems a lot of us owners are reporting speed of roughly 33.7 give or take a few hundredths. So... If this is consistent, then it must be deliberate right? Because if they can get their TT's to run consistently at around 33.7 then presumable they could get them all to run at 33.4...

 

One thing about Rega TT's. It seems a lot of us owners are reporting speed of roughly 33.7 give or take a few hundredths. So... If this is consistent, then it must be deliberate right? Because if they can get their TT's to run consistently at around 33.7 then presumable they could get them all to run at 33.4...

 

First, let me say that I am not a musician (I am a retired scientist) and I have recently changed TT's and I cannot alter the speed of my current TT. Second we are talk about a uniform speed change (which results in a uniform frequency or pitch change) not a frequency variation (wow and flutter) which are a different subject. I did some online research into this and here is what I learned.

In music a semitone is a 6% shift in frequency and just about everyone can hear such a change. For a 3150 Hz tone 6% is 189 Hz.

A shift in frequency of 3% is often not heard by the general listening audience. For a 3150 Hz tone 3% is about 95 Hz

Most people who are musically trained can hear a 1% shift in frequency. For a 3150 Hz tone 1% is 31.5 Hz

To do better than 1% one must be able to detect absolute pitch which is rare in humans but does exist. To put your speed change into the perspective of what I learned the 9 parts in 10,000 is (obviously) just a little less than 10 parts in 10,000 which is 1 part in 1,000 or 0.1% change in frequency. For a 3150 Hz tone 0.1% is about 3 Hz or the difference between 3147 Hz and 3150 Hz. Since, as I said, I am not a musician I doubt that I could hear such a change.

 

One thing about Rega TT's. It seems a lot of us owners are reporting speed of roughly 33.7 give or take a few hundredths. So... If this is consistent, then it must be deliberate right? Because if they can get their TT's to run consistently at around 33.7 then presumable they could get them all to run at 33.4...

 

First, let me say that I am not a musician (I am a retired scientist) and I have recently changed TT's and I cannot alter the speed of my current TT. Second we are talk about a uniform speed change (which results in a uniform frequency or pitch change) not a frequency variation (wow and flutter) which are a different subject. I did some online research into this and here is what I learned.

In music a semitone is a 6% shift in frequency and just about everyone can hear such a change. For a 3150 Hz tone 6% is 189 Hz.

A shift in frequency of 3% is often not heard by the general listening audience. For a 3150 Hz tone 3% is about 95 Hz

Most people who are musically trained can hear a 1% shift in frequency. For a 3150 Hz tone 1% is 31.5 Hz

To do better than 1% one must be able to detect absolute pitch which is very rare in humans but does exist. To put your speed change into the perspective of what I learned the 9 parts in 10,000 is (obviously) just a little less than 10 parts in 10,000 which is 1 part in 1,000 or 0.1% change in frequency. For a 3150 Hz tone 0.1% is about 3 Hz or the difference between 3147 Hz and 3150 Hz. Since, as I said, I am not a musician I doubt that I could hear such a change.

 

One thing about Rega TT's. It seems a lot of us owners are reporting speed of roughly 33.7 give or take a few hundredths. So... If this is consistent, then it must be deliberate right? Because if they can get their TT's to run consistently at around 33.7 then presumable they could get them all to run at 33.4... If there a reason for this?

 

First, let me say that I am not a musician (I am a retired scientist) and I have recently changed TT's and I cannot alter the speed of my current TT. Second we are talking about a uniform speed change (which results in a uniform frequency or pitch change) not a frequency variation (wow and flutter) which is a different subject. I did some online research into this and here is what I learned.

In music a semitone is a 6% shift in frequency and just about everyone can hear such a change. For a 3150 Hz tone 6% is 189 Hz.

A shift in frequency of 3% is often not heard by the general listening audience. For a 3150 Hz tone 3% is about 95 Hz

Most people who are musically trained can hear a 1% shift in frequency. For a 3150 Hz tone 1% is 31.5 Hz

To do better than 1% one must be able to detect absolute pitch which is rare in humans but does exist. To put your speed change into the perspective of what I learned the 9 parts in 10,000 is (obviously) just a little less than 10 parts in 10,000 which is 1 part in 1,000 or 0.1% change in frequency. For a 3150 Hz tone 0.1% is about 3 Hz or the difference between 3147 Hz and 3150 Hz. Since, as I said, I am not a musician I doubt that I could hear such a change.

 

So I ran the Dr Feickert test disk test disk and the result was 33.7 for my RP6, so around the same as the Turntabulator iPhone app. Not sure what to make of that...

 

Thats exactly the speed of my RP 6 too based on the app. It allows me to listen to more music each night. Seriously my musician buddy can hear it. I cannot.

 

33.34 on my new VPI Classic. Sounds really slow compared to my old Rega RP6.




Kidding.

 

1985 Linn LP12 with original pre-Cirkus bearing and two-year old Hercules II. Initially set up and adjusted for speed using the KAB disc while playing a record, nearly two years ago.

According to turntabulator app that I downloaded last weekend: 33.37 and 45.01, with the stylus in the outer grooves of standard weight vinyl. Using the KAB disc, still looks about spot on at both speeds (no visual drift), again with the stylus in the outer grooves of standard weight vinyl.

 

Yeah my RP 6 almost makes Nick Cave's new album a dance record.




I kid.

 

So Rega tune the RP6 to run at 33.7? I'd love to know the reasoning behind that...

 

Is it something to do with factoring in stylus drag on the record, and the weight of the record? That said, the RP6 is powered by the speed box, isnt it? You'd think that would be pretty much on purpose then, since other speed boxes (I'm told) make tt speeds more accurate e.g Pro-jects offering.

Or its as simple as Rega just think it sounds better.

 

I used the Dr Feickert test LP so that would take into account stylus drag etc. I was getting 33.75 from the iPhone app where you just place your phone on the TT and 33.7 from the test LP which uses a test tone to measure TT speed. So that's maybe why it was a little slower using that method...

 

My modded RP6 is at 33.42 and 45.17 with Turntabulator, that's with the stylus dragging in the groove. Never bothered me one iota.

 

I think that's it. They want the music to have get up & go and be exciting to listen to. A poor design choice in my book but you get used to it.

 

what mods are you using?

 

The mods that I guess may affect the speed are: Groovetracer Subplatter/Bearing & Counterweight, TangoSpinner Triple Brass Pulley & Opal (Silicone) Belts, and Michell Record Clamp.

 

It doesn't seem audible to me but then I'd have sit and do back to back comparisons with one that was running at the correct speed to know for sure... What's also a bit confusing is that none of the reviews I've read have these speed measurements. HiFi News has 33.43. Yet a lot of us seem to have around 33.7. Almost makes me want to send it back to Rega and get them to re-calaberate the speed!!