Many years ago I used to own an ADC Accutrac turntable with an Audio Technica cartridge. This fed a pair of Phase Linear III speakers through a 80 watt digital display JVC receiver. For this time in audio history (1976), this system was extraordinary, in appearance, functionality, and audio presentation. The speakers, being dipole, created an image around the speakers akin to what many dipole planer people today love. Regretfully, I sold the system, but memories of the sound remain in my mind to this day, which leads to the point of this post.

Since the world has gone digital, many people still hang onto the idea that analog, i.e. records, remain superior. Well, I'm not so sure. My memories of my old system is that every record sounded very good. The balance of the sound from the lowest to the highest frequencies sounded natural, and every recording was clear. The only real downside, in comparison to today, was a lack of soundstage depth. I assume that was due to having 10 drivers on each channel that were not phased aligned. Well, that's what I remember.

CD's, while technically superior to records, provide sound quality from the best sound I've heard to ear bleeding noise. In addition, some CD's lack the transparency that I remember so well. On the other hand, Cd's create a sense of depth to almost every recording. What concerns me are the bad CD's. As I said, I've never had a bad sounding record. I realize that my memories of the old system could be jaded. I was at a different time in my audio development and what I remember might not be accurate in reference to what I know today.

Curiosity got the best of me and I recently began looking into turntables. The pickings seem mighty slim. My old turntable was fully automatic with remote control. As for the sound, I couldn't find fault with it. It was my first decent turntable. Feedback was a non-issue and you could beat on it with almost no sound being heard through the speakers. My next turntable, after this one, was the complete opposite. It had an anti-resonant base and a carbon fiber tone arm, but I was constantly fighting feedback and I didn't dare touch it while it was playing or the the speakers would thump. One of the main differences between the old and the new was that the old had a floating turntable base, the new didn't.

With that said, It's been a while, but I've heard turntables running in some of the stores and never thought one way or the other about them. The sound didn't jump out at me as superior in any way. I do remember some sounding warm and pleasant, but unnatural. It could have been the system they were in. Moving on...

It occurred to me that it might be the recording rather than the medium that made one sound better, or worse. I went on utube and listened to people playing the same music, first on CD and then on record. Sometimes the CD sounded better and sometimes the record did. I even read that there were two different mixes, one for CD and one for vinyl. The CD version would be more compressed, hence the record would sound better over a decent system. I also realize that some of the utube comparisons could be biased due to inferior turntables and cartridges. I will add this, Most of the CD's that I own which are copies of the records I've owned sound terrible, to the point of being unlistenable on a quality system. This is the main reason for my interest in records,. I loved my record collection and would like to hear it again, sounding right...

So...

The question I'm asking all of you is... Am I barking up the wrong tree and are my expectations unrealistic.

Moving on to turntables...

Unlike some people, I believe that an automatic turntable doesn't have to degrade the sound in relation to a manual turntable, that's pure hokum. I would think that people who design turntables put more thought in building a better manual turntable to please the audiophiles and I think audiophiles over analyze the technology. It makes sense that the simpler the system is the less chance that the sound will be influenced by added features and I'm definitely not saying they are technically wrong, but there is a point beyond audibility, i.e. a 100lb platter does not sound better than a 50lb platter. Well, that's just my opinion. Admittedly, I am extremely ignorant about turntables.

From this point on, understand that my preference is an automatic turntable for a number of reasons. Manual turntables are really cool, but they are not for me.

Looking at present day turntable offerings (lower priced), I see Audio Technica, Denon, Pro-ject, Technics, Music Hall, and Rega have similar offerings in automatic turntables. I'm sure there are others... None of these have floating bases, but that may be a moot point.

Does anyone have any opinions of these brands? ...other options?