Rerurn to Romy the Cat's Site

I have owned and played with a couple of "classic" idler-driven TTs, but I was very young at the time, and incapable of pushing the design then, even if I'd wanted to.  As it happened, I abandoned the idler TTs for a belt-driven Rek-O-Kut "broadcast" model (!), for reasons of sonics.  Even though the stock Rek-O-Kut was no better in some areas (sonic break-through and "microphonic" self-noise), it was audibly better in terms of speed control (pitch, rhythm and dynamics).

With the almost hysterical "revival" of interest in the idler-driven designs, perhaps someone has finally figured out how to eliminate the sense that the music is being "dictated" by the motor.  I would not post this at AA (for the same reasons I would not kick a hornets' nest...), but I also got to this point with my Technics DDs, and I see the problem as not only related sonically, but similarly sourced, namely too great a reliance on the motor, itself.

We've beaten this one up pretty good in the past, but I have never gotten a satisfying response to the question, how does one physically isolate the (idler) motor, itself, from the platter, since the heavier the platter, the more powerful and "connected" the idler has to be, because of its operating principle?  I can see (and hear...) how a +/- pliable belt from a "barely big-enough" motor can provide "enough" drive to a massive platter to average out nicely, once the platter is up to speed.  But I still do not understand how the "Big Motor" approach makes things better than worse in the end, based on my own experience.

Paul S

Rerurn to Romy the Cat's Site