Usb turntables

[turner]

where can I buy one?

 

[Guest]

Where are you ? In the UK they are quite widely advertised -- and I think Richer Sounds have them.

From the sole test I've seen, the product was a very basic belt drive machine made from plastic and did not review too well -- as I recall, there were problems installing the deck to the computer. The conversion software was the familiar Audacity (which is fine but I think you even have to download it and the MP3 encoder).

You could achieve the same or better with a regular turntable and an old hifi amp -- just feed the tape output from the amp into the computer's sound card.

I've previously used a suspension-isolated Thorens 125 belt drive turntable for transcribing vinyl to digital, but to the job properly I installed Technics SL 1210 (as universally used by DJs).

The SL has almost the heavyweight construction of a quality hifi deck but it doesn't wobble like a suspended belt drive model and has the unique feature is that it stops and starts almost instantly -- really helpful when cueing up vinyl.

All direct drive turntables have quartz lock speed control which gives an unwavering tempo like a a CD source.

The Technics sound quality is better than I expected from the rather basic tone arm and rumble is well suppresed. The catch is cost -- but there are a lot of ex-disco Technics on e-bay -- just try to choose one that hasn't been thrashed.