Hello Alan,

Thanks for sharing your wonderful experiences. It looks like, for the sake of convenience, the Olympos and Olympos SL cartridges were compared using the Graham Phantom Supreme tonearm but presumably the best possible performance is obtained in partnership with one of the FR-series tonearms? I recently sent my Phantom Mk2 tonearm off for the Supreme upgrade and am hopeful that when it returns it will allow more of the Olympos' capabilities to be maximised.

Best Regards,
Aaron

drajreynolds February 15, 2012 00:52

url=http://i42.tinypic.com/282kye.jpg]The Sin(Tex)[/url]

Oympos and Olympos SL in the Bavarian Alps

Different-In-Kind

More to come...

unoear February 14, 2012 20:01

Audiophile Visit from Texas

A single ear lands in Bavaria for some really nice times; the music was also GREAT!

I must say that the Syntax system is the best audio room that I have had, by far, the most pleasure listening to tunes. The big Sieke with the FR tonearms is simply done right without any compromises or bottlenecks that may inhibit maximizing the sonic ability of this machine, super! The chain, from the clean mains to the transducers, is the product of Syntax's ability to listen and find that differences and solutions are there to be found.

It was interesting to hear the overachieving new Lamm LL2.1 and the super Lamm LP2 Deluxe with the special SUT. This phono-stage was able to deliver 70 + dB of gain and effortlessly drive cartridges with outputs as low as 0.17 mV. Syntax and myself were simply amazed with this combination delivering energy into the Syntax-modified designs of the Lamm ML2.1 amplifiers...definitely not for the faint of heart.

The first day we started out comparing cartridges, his Olympos to my Olympos SL. This system is an effective conduit for finding the underlying flow of what is going on with the music. From all venues of music (well, there was no rap) we went back and forth with flow of energy from these cartridges. It came down to a little more body and lift with the Olympos and a little more finesse and detail with the Olympos SL. Both were simply desirable and enjoyable! Dealer disclosure for Lamm.

More to come!

unoear February 14, 2012 19:39

One of the issues I see between the active and passive units is the constant maintenance of platform height and level. With my passive unit, I must re-inflate the pistons and then confirm height and level about once a week. I know Syntax does this much less often and perhaps there is a slow leak in my unit. I plan to check all hose connections and repair if needed.

With the active Vibraplane unit, height and level are automatically maintained by the unit and compressor so if the platter is on the VP and the motor and controller are on a different platform, relative distances are better preserved than they are with a passive unit that slowly decreases in height over time. This changes relative distances, belt/thread tensions and so forth and would effect performance.

So there is one argument in favor of the active unit as I see it or in something like the Halcyonics device.

There is no argument in my mind though, that proper isolation can make a tremendous improvement to an analog system.

peterayer February 14, 2012 16:21

Hello D,

If I understand you correctly, one can place the turntable chassis/platter assembly anywhere on the passive Vibraplane's top surface without paying any performance penalty. Is this not also the case for the active version of the Vibraplane? I can certainly understand why the centre of mass of the payload must be centred atop the Minus-K platform and that this is sometimes tricky and the end result potentially less than elegant.

What material do you suggest for use under the Micro-Seiki RY-5500 drive motor, or any turntable drive mechanism for that matter, in order to achieve the required height for the turntable chassis/platter assembly atop the Vibraplane? Maybe this is not so critical provided the platter assembly is properly damped and isolated from building resonance?

In your experience how sensitive is the vinyl playback system (i.e. cartridge/tonearm/platter/chassis/drive mechanism) to air-borne resonance from a loudspeaker's acoustic output? Is the only solution to locate the vinyl playback equipment in an isolated room? I am sure this would become very inconvenient and make on-the-fly optimisation of SRA for each LP side very difficult or impossible.

Regards,
Aaron

drajreynolds February 14, 2012 00:36

Thank you Dertonarm. I'm curious about the difference between the active and passive Vibraplane units. Perhaps I will start a thread....

peterayer February 13, 2012 22:19

Hi D.

Are you ever spot-on dead centered?

Alan

unoear February 13, 2012 18:42

Dear Peterayer, der Drajreynolds, let me add my two cents here, as I have had some experiences in the past 2 years in setting up Minus-Ks and Vibraplanes in several systems.

It would be contra-productive to place both - motor as well as plinth/turntable - each on it's own Minus-K. There would be constant relative-movement and that would certainly made the concept of thread-drive with calculated slippage impossible to implement.
The inertia unit itself runs very smooth, is very heavy and well damped and I do not think that there is any significant risk that it would induce extra vibrations into the turntable itself.

The MInus-K provides excellent results ONLY, if the turntable is placed dead center.
It is not easy to set-up correctly and may very well put one's nerves to the test.
It's full mechanical suspension, based on a one-point dead center concept is the Minus-K's big advantage and provides indeed excellent (far better in terms of much lower resonance frequency provided) results. When used with a thread drive concept one must make sure however that the tension of the belt is pre-calculated into the center-concept and request.

The Vibraplane does not go as low in frequency resonance as the Minus-K. But it is much more easy to set up.
An active Vibraplane by Kinetic Systems is a different subject. One must not forget the even more costly solutions by Halyconics.

The Vibraplane under Syntax' amps does indeed bring significant results. The Lamm power amplifiers do feature large, single pc board for the whole circuit. These large pc boards are dead stiff bolted to the cabinet. Thus all mechanical vibrations picked up by the cabinet are directly conducted to the circuit. Hence the isolation provided by the Vibraplanes are pretty significant here.
Syntax knows his stuff.

In a few weeks Syntax will be able to give first impressions about active air suspension in turntable set-up and it's virtues ....

Cheers,
D.

dertonarm February 13, 2012 08:09

Out where the mains are clean and the air is pure...Elvis lives!

unoear February 10, 2012 04:23

Hello Syntax,
Thank you for that very thorough explanation. I also enjoyed reading Drajreynolds' comments. I agree the Vibraplane is a relative bargain for the price and compared to the competition. I did not know the Minus K is less stable. Perhaps it has to be loaded very evenly to remain level because of the springs. I think I would like to own the active VP unit with the compressor though that is more expensive. I understand the issue with the rotating parts of the Micro Seiki being on the same platform and one advantage of the Vibraplane is that it is so large. Someday I may try the VP under my amps. Amp stands can easily cost more than $2K.

I'm not sure a completely agree with your take on the suspension of the Basis and SME tables. SME also uses a paddle and oil or silicone to damp vibrations in those towers, so it is not only the cheap rubber bands that are exposed/visible that make the solution. Perhaps it is not as elegant looking, but I think it might be equally effective.

You and Drajreynolds are not the only people to recommend the Graham arm with the SME table. I read that the Graham was developed on an SME 30 table, so it must be a great combination.

peterayer January 22, 2012 19:14

Hello Drajreynolds,
Very good (no, excellent) posting. Can't add more, you always got the point.
An addition, I know, lots of motors are rattling and produce a lot of vibrations. The old Seiki doesn't. I opened it some time ago and what these engineers made 30 years ago is simply amazing. Adjustable, no noise, very heavy...design done right. And: Spot on with Timeline :-)

syntax January 22, 2012 18:42

Hi Peter,
Good questions from you. Will try my best to give useful answers.
Basis + Vibraplane
Indeed, the Basis has an excellent working suspension and the addition of a Vibrapalne is not so successful compared to a Micro or other unsuspended Designs. I made a few comparisons with the Basis with and without Vibrplane. The sonic step ahead with it is audible, it is not a sonic blockbuster improvement, but it can be heard. Deeper Soundstage, an improved Headroom in the upper frequencies and no more acoustical feedback through the cartridge. The VP is able to isolate deeper Hz and some of my classical Records show this clearly.
When I would use a SME 30 I would buy one,too. Cables are more expensive than that unit. It is made for serious use in Labor / Hospital and the price from 2k$ is ok. Would it be used in High End Dealer Promotion it would be sold for 20 K$ :-)

Seiki + Vibraplane
There is no advantage for this or that configuration. Everything what is onto the VP is isolated properly and stable (compared to Minus-K for example).
Before I got the HS-80 unit, motor & platter were onto VP with excellent results. After getting the VP I had to made a decision because it is not large enough for all 3 units. So I decided to give the motor its own base and the both rotation units (Platter & HS-80) - which are linked toghether and need an absolutely precise height levelling - onto the VP.
The VP does an excellent job, I can knock onto the rack, the platter, the spindle, the chassis when the needle is in the groove and the Phono Poti is open and it is .... Silent.
Try that with other turntable designs (be careful).
And btw. Here the difference is MUCH_MUCH more audible than with the Basis combination (Basis is a better construction in stock mode but the Micro can be modified to a real interesting level of performance)

Vibraplane Air
I use 3 of them and I bought all new. There is a big warning to move them when the feet are filled with Air. This will damage them.
When they were new the air hoses stretched and I had to control them 1x a week but when it is done it is stable after a while. My units are 3 years old now (or 5?), I check them now 1x in 2 months, only 1 move per pump in each valve and that‘s it. Mine work the way they should. For me, by far one of the best audio investments I ever made. Not so flabby like Minus-K, easy to go, enough size for a lot of units (2 of them I use below my amps, I saw so much amp stands for a lot of more money and they are more or less a joke, pretty uselss. No unit onto rattles like an old motor, what you need is to isolate feedback and internal movements, no piece of wood or plastic can do it properly. One reason why electron microscopes are not placed on SRA, HRS platforms or butcher blocks...)

Basis / SME
Yes, I did compare them. I had luck lots of years ago when a Dealer had both Tables in Store. But in a way it was not possible to do a 100% shootout. The main difference at that time was the used Arm (Cartridge was from me). The Basis had at that time a Graham 2.0 Arm and the SME 30 a SME V and my choice was Graham 2.0. The difference wasn‘t that huge at that time but when Graham offered the Phantom later, the SME V was sonically absolutely not in the same league. And the internal wire from the V is (and never was) good (from my kind of Standard).
I never trust the - cheap - rubber suspension, Basis had MUCH more clever solutions (Spring in oil dampers), the belt quality is light years ahed from the precision, the multi composite platter offers much more intelligent vibration transfer and when you look closer to all parts, Basis really IS precision. And his vacuum design is simply from another design world. Not negative to sound (because it is a low pressure design), not destroying its bearing (like other designs do) and super reliable day in day out.
But everyone has its own preferences, so, when I would use a SME 20/30 I would match it with Graham Phantom supreme in 9“.
Then you can close that chapter. The Geometry is done right and you will never have distortion with certain records :-)

syntax January 22, 2012 16:10

Hi Peter,

I am also interested in the rationale behind placing the already suspended Basis turntable (or any of the suspended SME turntables for that matter) on a Vibraplane. My current understanding is that the Basis suspension is effective from around 6 Hz. This is fine for all manner of commonly encountered vibrations generated within the turntable itself (no turntable is without them since truly perfect engineering does not exist in this universe). The Vibraplane, and Minus-K platforms, have much lower resonant frequencies in both the horizontal and vertical planes when properly implemented and this provides a large degree of isolation from building resonance. The ideal environment in which a turntable-tonearm-cartridge system operates is not unlike that required for an electron microscope. In theory, there should not be any "coupling" or direct interaction between the Basis (or SME) turntable's suspension and the "suspension" of the Vibraplane (or Minus-K) due to the significantly lower resonant frequency of the latter. Of course if you sharply hit the equipment rack that might set things in motion but who does this while listening to music?

The issue of changing the belt tension of a suspended turntable by placing the motor on a different, non-suspended surface is something I have asked A. J. Conti about in the past. If I recall correctly his reply was along the lines of the additional isolation from motor noise far outweighs any minimal change in belt tension under normal operating conditions. He went on to state that the errors in the degree of roundness of most platters is many times greater than any microscopic change in belt tension by having the motor on non-suspended surface. The guys from Continuum Audio Labs clearly have a different take on things.

I think you might be confused regarding Syntax's Micro Seiki configuration. The fly-wheel (inertia unit) shares the Vibraplane with the turntable and the drive motor is located on a separate, non-suspended platform in order to get the thread drive height correct. I suspect that the fly-wheel does not feed as much noise into the platter as the drive motor otherwise might. In the perfect world one might use separate isolation platforms for each of the drive motor, turntable and fly-wheel (say three Minus-K platforms each tuned to 0.5 Hz).

Syntax will no doubt comment on the upkeep of the Vibraplane but in my prior discussions with him it seemed to be very undemanding.

I suspect that part of the performance improvement in the suspended SME turntables relative to your model 10 comes from isolating the main turntable chassis from the motor, at least to a certain extent. You might wish to try a Graham Phantom Mk 2 Supreme tonearm in place of your SME V before considering changing the turntable itself. This tonearm is a killer when paired with a vintage Fidelity Research FR-1Mk3F, assuming one's phono preamp is up to the task.

Regards,
Aaron

drajreynolds January 21, 2012 07:09

Syntax, Congratulations on a wonderful system which must sound great. I respect your experience and I have a few questions regarding your turntables.
I notice that you have two passive Vibraplanes. I also have one under my SME 10 table. I understand the use of the VP under the unsuspended Micro Seiki table, but I'm curious about the benefit of using one under the Basis table which already has a good suspension system. I ask because I am considering betting an SME 30 and I don't know if it would benefit by being placed on a Vibraplane.

Also, for the Vibraplane under the Micro Seiki, do you find there are any issues with the flywheel being supported by a fixed platform which does not move vertically compared to the table proper and motor which are on the VP and will thus move down over time as the air suspension on the passive unit deflates? I would think that the belt/thread would move and not be stable between the flywheel and the main table. How often does your VP need to be raised/adjusted? I check mine every couple of days and add air about once per week.

Also, do you notice any issue with the Micro Seiki motor vibration by placing the motor and table both on the same VP platform? My controller and table are on the same platform, but the motor itself is on the table. My controller vibrates a tiny amount and I would like to move it to a separate isolation platform, but I don't have the rack space.

Finally, do you have any experience with the SME 30? I have not read anyone comparing it to a Micro Seiki or to a Basis. Thank you.

peterayer January 20, 2012 22:54

That is a very good idea. I totally forgot that. Today I opened my box (from Aesthetix Callisto NOS tubes) and I found the right ones I think:

Amperex 7308 NOS 1960s Dutch PQ Gold Pins

This is a very good match, huge Soundstage & more lifelike based on their superior tonal colors.
I also have a few new - sealed box-old Telefunken E88CC from Germany, ultra low noise, gold pins from 1960...also a good choice.

syntax January 12, 2012 20:13

Hello Syntax,

I am happy to see your comments regarding the Lamm R1.2M amplifiers and how they are sounding in your system. Sounding as well as these amplifiers do freshly out of the box, they really blossom after a couple of weeks down the road into the burn-in process. I know that you are passionate about getting the most out of your system; when you get around to tube rolling with these amplifiers, please share with us your preferred selected choice(s.) I am looking forward to hearing your system!

Kind regards,
Alan

unoear January 11, 2012 17:11

Update for M1.2R
I am really amazed how much the Performance improves after factory burn in. Increase of detail and body, depth of soundstage increase day by day. This amp needs better power cords than the stock ones. I used them first (being lazy) and after some records I know very well I realized a more narrow Soundstage compared to ML2.1. I use now their PC's with Oyaide plugs and Soundstage is now deeper, wider with more definition to the single instruments. Amazing.

syntax January 11, 2012 06:33

Will visit Syntax' set-up this weekend and will report of eventual sonic changes due to the new Lamm 1.2R shortly.
Stay tuned.
Cheers,
D.

dertonarm January 05, 2012 16:50

Hello Drajreynolds,

from my experience the Reference 3A speakers are easy to drive. They use good chassis and they sound great.
Magneplanars run in a way with nearly everything but when I changed amps, they never got enough power. 2x100W at the beginning was good, later I tried 2x200W and it was better, then 2x400W and better again. Then monos and so on...I stopped that because really good sounding high power amps are very, very expensive (and very hard to find). No way out.
The Maggies are cheap to buy but later this will be compensated with amps... Based on that I decided to go for high efficient speaker designs, they made life much easier for me.

syntax January 05, 2012 07:13

Hello Syntax,

It is hard to decide which is more inspiring, the system and its capabilities or the stunning view through the listening room window.

In your experience, which loudspeaker system would be an ideal match for the power output of the M1.2R whilst also showing this amp's sonic capabilities? Reference 3A Grand Veena? Enough power for Magnepan?

Enjoy the music,
Aaron

drajreynolds January 03, 2012 23:34

Hi Unoear,

yeah indeed. It is like going back to the first love. Years ago I listened to them and I heard something I never forgot all over the years (a unique natural performance from Transistor amps) but I lost them out of sight because I discovered the fascination of high sensitive speakers which can show the magic from the first watt (or the magic IN the first watt). I always looked for a matched pair, meaning for THIS speaker THAT amp or the other way...
After your friendly invitation to listen to your System with ML3, our informative conversation about Lamm in general and their abilities, I remembered my old love, the M1.2R and made my decision to go for it.

Lamm M1.2R Amplifier

My speaker is in a way too sensitive (99dB) for its power but of course, it is able to show what this amp really can do. And that is really something special. I listened to a lot of amps the last 20 years, but honestly, I never heard this kind of naturalness, effortless speed, materialized Body in such completeness from any Transistor before.

Area

.

syntax January 03, 2012 18:42

Hello Syntax,

Congratulations on the arrival of the Lamm M1.2R amplifiers to compliment your system, an audio system that is simply done right! I look forward to reading about your impressions on how these amplifiers integrate with your other components. As usual, really nice pictures and a man with a patient disposition and wonderful sense of humor!

Happy listening,
Alan

unoear January 03, 2012 04:25

now that's a cartridge selection! when I get around to upgrading mine we'll have to talk! Thanks for sharing all this. Barry

barrysandy December 31, 2011 16:54

The synergistic (hopefully .... ) effects between the electromechanical transducer (cartridge) and the tonearm are exemplary demonstrated by the FR-60s tonearms in conjunction with the FR-7 series of cartridges.
The spring-mass relations as well as the ability to conduct and transmit the energy of the tracking process very fast from the cartridge to the arm board is key.
The FR-60s tonearms and FR-7 cartridges do form a singular synergistic match in analog audio. Each being designed with the other in mind and taking into account all the mechanic-dynamic parameters of the other.
Proofing IMHO that cartridge and tonearm can never be viewed nor judged independently. There is no universal tonearm and there is no cartridge "working best on most every good tonearm".
Done right, the whole picture is always more than the sum of the pieces ....

dertonarm December 30, 2011 10:51