I too am a customer of HiFi Buys in Atlanta; David White their “analog guy” is wonderful and has helped me with various components, including a Luxman 509x integrated and the D10x SACD/DAC. I am a big Luxman fan. I am primarily an analog girl, and I also just ordered the Luxman PD151 MK2 for a secondary system, with a Hana Umami Blue cartridge. Clearly great minds think alike. 😉 I am definitely looking forward to cartridge swapping in the future. Happy to hear you are enjoying your new turntable. Also, yes the cartridges will continue to break in and should sound better and better over time. 😊
Good stuff! Yes, David is very knowledgable. I've been dealing with Bryan because of our friendship but that shop is full of knowledge and experience. Who knows, maybe if they invite Luxman for one of their After Dark events, I'll be able to win an amp... it could happen!
The most interesting thing for me was the end where you talk about needing to solve other problems that this upgrade exposed. That is something I rarely hear from other audiophile people when talking about upgrading, the idea that spending money can put you in a position where you want (feel the need) to spend even more money fixing the new issues you get from upgrading your system. I have yet to hear a true mono playback machine - I hope you enjoy your journey. Great video - thanks from making it.
Nice vid, don’t overthink it, Luxman and Hana are good stuff, and having a local shop to set it up, etc. is a necessity. Cartridges take at least 50 hours to break in, even 100. BTW, mono well done has a great soundstage, I have many mono shaded dogs that sound fabulous. And yes, the better the equipment the more obvious the faults of the LP are exposed, poor production, mastering, pressing are exposed big time. And nice Bev K LP, an under appreciated vocalist.
Not a necessity. I set it up out of the box with no issue and this is just my second turntable. Leave it up to someone else and you'll have lingering doubts.
Congratulations on your new table & cartridges! New gear is exciting when it allows you to connect with your music even more. After a decade of interacting with the audiophile community both in forums and in person, it's really important to just take any gear advice with a grain of salt. Personal experience and how things sound in your own system, in your own space, to your own ears is all that matters. Luxman has a pretty storied history with amplifiers and I've heard quite a few great ones. I had one on my short list of amps to consider at one point! It's a respected brand and tends to pair with Tannoy speakers especially well (which is what I used to have). The Luxman MQ-300, for example, is really stunning. I use a Hana ML on my table myself and love it (though itching to try the Umami red!). It took about 100ish hours for it to fully open up though, so I'd imagine it will be the same with yours. I usually can't ever do true critical listening until that point. I've used a lot of cartridges in the past, including ortofon black, Benz micro (various), etc - the Hana ML is by far my favorite so far. Exceptional value for money! The biggest drawback to using these higher end cartridges is that they are rather unforgiving to bad recordings or dirty/damaged records. Always fun to take some listening notes on the first couple test albums and then come back to them after 75-100 hours and see if my thoughts have changed. It's usually a night and day difference haha. You can further elevate your experience with an upgrade to the phono pre-amp. It's probably the 'weakest link' now for you considering the rest of your list of gear, but sounds like you're aware already. I just upgraded mine last year and demoed quite a few in the sub-5000 range before landing on the one I got. Enjoy the music!
Congrats on the nice turntable, nothing better than a decent source! I wouldn’t do serious listening before 100 hrs of break-in time, it goes by quickly w/ the amount of Jazz we love to play. A dedicated phono preamp will take this setup to another level, especially since Luxman are well known for their phono equipment. Very happy for you, great videos!
It really looks like an interesting turntable. It seems to be often compared to the Technics SL-1200G and Yamaha GT2000. These are pretty good products to compete with. The fact it’s still manufactured in Japan is a good sign also they are not cutting corners.
agreed, I would have been nervous otherwise. I've actually heard some great sounding chi-fi tube amps, and they are an easy and inexpensive way to try out the tube sound, but if I'm going to spend good money on a table, I like that it's made in Japan
I have the Luxman and a Hana ML. I’ve owned the pair over a year - it’s been a great purchase. Likely to be my last turntable purchase. The ML is great on this table.
Congrats on your new TT! I hope you enjoy the new toy and the continued journey you're on. The suspension on the cartridges need some time to break in. Warmer climate temperature will quicken the break-in time.
Interesting about the mono records being more exposed in terms of surface noise. I’ve always heard the opposite from mono system champions..that mono setups reduce the amount of audible noise on mono records 🤷♂️🤷♂️
A mono stylus may ride at a different depth (typically more shallow) in the groove versus the stereo cartridge's stylus. Also the record may have many more plays with a mono stylus wearing the grooves on the record. Finally a stereo cartridge's stylus likely has a narrower profile which sits lower in the groove where there has been less wear, but on the contrary also have more microscopic contamination at the same time sitting at the lowest levels in the grooves.
Same Hana SL (Stereo) here with Technics 1200...sounds great---good luck with the new table etc... love your vids ...you are one of the really good reviewers and commenators here in the VC..JG
As long as your happy that’s all that counts , it’s an amazing turntable . I was between the Luxman and the technics 1200g and ended up with technics and I’m happy with my decision people have different opinions and as long as your happy it’s worth every penny !
I kept a diary daily of the quality of sound from Hana; at 50 h better, 100 h much better. A year later way f’n better; amazing and equally amazing it took that long
I like hearing your story, always good to learn from others experiences. I've known Chris Lowe for ~25 years, which I assume is still at Hifi Buys, probably should catch up with him. An old roommate also worked for Buys when they were building new stores and setting up the car audio display rooms. He has some pretty good stories from building car audio systems.
Ken Kessler has just given this TT a fantastic review , calling it sublime . I consider your choice of Luxman is quite sensible . They have been around a long time and have a mighty history of turning out thoroughly researched and developed products . In my 50years as an enthusiast and now retired retailer , Luxman always turned out products that are not only high quality but in reach . HiFi is very subjective but the good makers seem to stick around.
Stunning TT but I don't understand why they cost almost double in the USA (vs the rest of the world).... whereas Technics TT's are comparably priced globally...
I’m not sure, could be something to do with the distribution in the U.S. and having margin for resellers. I also know that there are a number of these that pop up on eBay that appear to be new but are actually scratch & dent / returns that are being sold out of Japan
The Luxman stuff is lovely and built to last. With regard to your Hana carts, as has been noted, they will take around 100 hours to fully open up. I have the Hana Umami Red and it took time, a lot of time. But when it finally settled in it was a sublime Cart. I wouldn’t play your records on silent unless they sound absolutely terrible. Play them and listen to the evolution of your cartridge. I personally found that quite interesting in and of itself. Anyway, congrats. It’ll only be onwards and upwards from here.
Even though I am not into modern gear (vintage hifi til I die) a legacy brand like luxman would be something I would probably consider if buying new. A real luxury Japan company with strong history, plus your table has classic looks to boot. Good choice all things considered
Great turntable .. hope you enjoy it . Breakin takes some time , between cart and new wiring as well. And yes records will be more revealing so bad recordings will sound worse possibly but on the plus side great recordings will sound fantastic
I do have some 78s however I think I’ll continue to play those on another turntable. I’ve had a vintage Dual turntable with 78rpm and 16rpm speed options for a while
The hana cartridges will continue to break in, I have the SL and it sounds beautiful. A couple of things to think about is that having a mono switch on your preamp and preamp or your preamp really helps. I also think it will be really interesting to maybe try out some different phono preamps down the line. And also like other people said don't try to overthink it too much or compare it to munch to what you had You're going to have so much more transparency and then you had before and it's just going to take a while to acclimate to that. I think the way that you put it with the mono cartridge as starting to hear some more error around the instruments, as things break in that's going to be the water you're swimming in.
Interesting that for a lot of people wrong just means you didn't do what they did. Luxman is a well-respected brand in Japan. I haven't considered their turntables but that's just because I'm happy with my "ugly" ;-) (I like how it looks, I'm just busting your balls a bit) Technics SL-1500c. I also had a Rega P1 and liked it but was annoyed with some of its old school annoyances such as having to remove the platter to change speed. What I'm interested in from Luxman is one of their class A amps (though it would be used, as they've discontinued them from their line up). Luckily, I live in Tokyo, so Luxman is not only well known but readily available. Anyway, I hope you enjoy your new table. I'm really curious about your Hana carts.
If I had money for this price range of turntable Id definitely consider this one. At the moment I’m looking at a U Turn custom with the Ortofon Blue as my first turntable.
I used to have a PD-264 when I was younger and wanted to get one again. I was shocked to see how much people were selling them for. It's a nice turnable but wow, not that nice.
So....I'm currently "systemless"....slowly putting together my next/last rig (I'm 62). Not sure that I'll ever go the mono cartridge route....I have no older original mono pressings, and only a few mono reissues. That being said (and I'm no expert about this - just offering food for thought about your situation), original mono's and reissued mono's are cut completely different. Groove depth is much different between the two. Again - I'm no expert - but I wouldn't expect a mono cartridge that sounds great with originals to sound that great with mono reissues. Some say mono reissues will likely sound better with a stereo cartridge. (??? Maybe ???) It's worth researching (especially for me), because if I ever go that route I don't want to get frustrated, scratching my head and saying, "what the hell"??!! I'm just dumb enough about the whole thing that I may not set up a listening session properly to start with.
You should contact your dealer about getting a third cart to play your old Blue Note monos properly - sorry to break the news to you but the groove sizes on old monos were different to stereo (new mono pressings have same smaller groove size as stereo). So if you really want to hear all those original monos playing to their max.... Check out Ortofon SPU 25 or similar
Does your Nigeria Tone Poet have a strange, click sounding drum track on the right channel? Mine sounds very odd. I have a Japanese pressing that does not have this odd sound, but the mastering otherwise is not as good as the TP. It also happens on different tables and different carts. It's not a set up issue.
I have and I’ve actually been able to demo some Heresy II’s in the past. I may actually be coming into a set of Paradigm Model 100 series speakers soon, but not sure if that’s going to materialize, which I know is not at all what you’re talking about, but maybe my point is I’m willing to try out options to see what sounds best!
I have a slew of different lighting in here. What I'd ideally like is all Philips Hue controllable from my phone. What I have though is several different brands of strip lighting from Lowes / Home Depot that I stuck to the back of my shelves. If I do end up reorganizing the room, I may just go for something nicer
My sales guy told me 20~ hrs on the Hana ML break-in. He has 35 years of experience and personally owns a ML and a P6, same setup as mine. I noticed somewhere, either the manual pdf or the Hana website they recommend 50~ hours. I just have crossed over the 50 hour mark.
Same here. @jazzvinylcollector . I own a Rega P6 and just replaced my old hana sl with a new one. Though the same cart it sounded ugly and cheap out of the box. Now after a couple of hours (about 20) I got large improvements, and Chet Baker My Favorite Songs (1988 enja) blew me away. With th any record played, sound improves massively in depth, highs, stage. My old SL broke in about 50-100 to its sweetspot, worn off after 1000 hrs. Cheers from Germany Klaus
@@KS-yy2fu Well, you answered my next question: How long did the old one last? 1000 hours is about what I've understood. How did you know it was time to replace it?
@@aa5az423 bass pronouncuation decreased. Highs lost brilliance did not give much room. It got obvious after replacement. I was first noticing it on my non audiophilecurrent pressings like the regular John Coltrane Ballads. Hope that helps.
Hey thanks for the video, I'm curious to know why you use a phono stage when you have the McIntosh preamp you can plug your turntable into. Was this recommended to you and do you hear a difference? I have a Mac 2105 and C26 also. Thanks Brown!
The reason is that Moving coil cartridges are typically low output and so just a regular preamp is insufficient. If I was using moving magnet cartridges, it’d be no problem
yea its a complaint i've heard frequently. Believe me, I wouldn't have purchased it at that price, but judging it independent of its price, it is a very nice dustcover (just not $800 nice)
It’s not a rip off. It’s an absolutely beautiful turntable (and dust cover) and you pay for design, fit and finish. You can spend $10,000 for a watch, or $25. They both tell time. Get what you like!!
What do I know, I strongly believe in economic ' point of diminishing returns'. and if someone else has a different idea, not my concern, at all. and then Ya mention KEF 50 spks, which I have. I have a 45 year old Pioneer full auto t'table, still work fine far as I can tell. THAT is a product. got a new thorns 103 a while ago, just for kicks. prettier, yea. better ? I prefer video concert DVD to LP ,(D.Krall, Paris. A.Netrebko. LaTraviatta to name drop - booo, too commercial.....) > no question to me concert DVD's are the best improvement since the 1970 ish burst of Hi Fi interest. ( Beatlemaniacs getting jobs, $$$ including me. ). as far as equipment - I think IF by magic a new example of my orig stereo happened by, I'd be OK with it , except 15 w / ch needs a boost , to maybe 60+ per..... Pioneer receiver , Dynaco 25 spks. AR T'table.
I know Luxman is good, but not that good. Just saying, or is it the crypto money in the works 😢. Personally, I think for that price range, the Michell or ClearAudio or maybe a Technics will be my choice. I am running 2 vintage Technics linear tracking, 2 Fluance and one vintage Denon at the moment and the Luxman can paid for all decks including all cartridges I have on. 😅
bummed to hear such a nice electronics brand is now owned by china, which is actively funding anti democratic chaos in America and other countries . . one can break in a cartridge by sitting it on a record without playing . I had to smile when the guy said he got a discount on an eight hundred dollar dust cover , and was happy with that. clearly shows that value is subjective. it strikes me as naive to think a shop is searching for product beyond what they sell. perhaps I heard that wrong.
