I know, I know, as John Crabbe used to say and probably still does"There's no such thing as a bass transient! As pointed out in this month's "Letters" section, the harmonic content that goes to form the leading edge of, say, the sound of a bass drum struck hard, is much higher in frequency: in the upper midrange and above.īut what else would you call the sound of a drum? Model-based systems engineering documentation and analysisĮver since I first used the original Mission tonearm designed by John Bicht, now of Versa Dynamics fameI have been sensitive to any smearing of that bass-transient information, ruling out for me such an otherwise excellent arm as the Eminent.
Bass transients should shock the listener, but both on parallel-tracking arms and on arms that use a knife-edge bearing, they kind of sneak up on the listener instead, defusing the impact.
So why, then, given my recognition of the merits of the eight arms above, have I stuck with the Linn Ittok LVII arm for most of the last eight years' worth of listening? Putting to one side the question of cost, it's down to two things: bass quality, and the fact that a record-playing system is just that: a system.įirst, although I'm told the Airtangent gets remarkably close, I have never heard a tonearm without a fixed pivot and gimbal vertical bearings give the tightness of bass that I find essential to musical enjoyment. Gordon Holt's preferred choice but what in my mind gets the nearest to achieving the sonic equivalent of being a black cat in an unlit room is the SME V and its lower-cost cousin, the IV. It would be safe to say none, but a few get close to that paradigm: the legendary Swiss Breuer was the first tonearm I heard that was more like a pickup arm, while Sumiko's no-longer-in-production "The Arm" built further on that performance certainly the Airtangent tonearm reviewed a couple of months back by Arnie Balgalvis deserves a high ranking in this category as does the Eminent Technology ET2 in the midrange the Rega RB is a surprisingly low-priced contender Bill Firebaugh's Well-Tempered Arm is J. Is it not reasonable, therefore, to insist that the anachronistic usage is actually a more correct description of the role of the arm in determining ultimate sound quality? Unless the arm is so good that it doesn't make any contribution. In a metaphor coined in the '60s by the English pickup cartridge expert Jean Walton, the situation is akin to a Model T being driven at speed over a rough, off-road course. Plenty is left over to excite all manner of resonances in every physical part of the disc playback system-cantilever, cartridge body, arm, and turntable. In practice, however, not all the mechanical energy imparted the stylus by the wiggling groove being dragged past it is transformed into an electrical signal. Second-hand Linn Tonearm for sale on UK's largest auction and classifieds sites
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