I never gave vinyl up
Although some of the shortcomings of my Project Debut 2 were beginning to take the edge off my enjoyment. So I found that Henley Designs offers a noise reduction kit that is supposed to eliminate the rumble that was just audible enough to annoy, and Hey Presto, so little rumble that I had to check that I'd actually put the needle on the silent track!
OK, I said to myself. Time replace the stock OM-5e cartridge that was 'just about good enough' with my hoarded Ortofon VMS20e MKII and set it up. Oh, and dig out the Osawa OM-10 mat and the HiFi News test disk. I've been meaning to do this for a while, but the rumble and time pressures just prevented me from carrying it through.
Well, I always liked the sound of the Project, but now it's sublime. So much so that the Wife does not see me many evenings as I revisit disks that I've not played for years.
My biggest problem is that the glue on the sleeves of my LPs is degrading. Every time I get a disk down, the sleeve comes apart. Also, the paper inner sleeves are starting to shed wood fibres, so a deep clean is needed. Somehow, it appears that my collection has got slightly damp, but I can't work out how. It was in storage for some months during a house move, which is the most likely time.
I am not an extreme audiophile. My setup has always been only one step above budget, but was bought as best-buy in their class. Besides the Project, it's a NAD 7020 receiver, JVC KD720 tape desk and Keesonic Kub speakers, but the combination is really quite good. There's also a Technics CD player as well, but I don't know the model off the top of my head.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
