A big THANK YOU to Jack, Rob and all!!! Denon turntable successfully set up!!!!

MusicDirector

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:)A BIG THANK YOU to Jack, Rob and all who responded to me and helped put me on the straight and narrow (pun) to setting up my Denon (and other turntables). You guys cut through the confusion I had for 2 years!
I now announce that the Denon DP47f has been successfully (I think) set up with the Shure M97xE cart. I chose to do that one for now until I get real settled to do the super expensive Ortofon 2M Bronze.
It took me an hour to do this. Sorry, but that's as fast as I can go with it. (I can do it in about 45 minutes if I do it wrong).:rolleyes:
I aligned it using the Stevenson protractor. The alignment is the hardest part. I struggled to get a good viewing angle with good light, but could not quite get there, so I did my best with what I had. I found that I only had to adjust once to get it. (I hope I got it).
I verified the tracking force (using the power on trick, that was the secret) and it is spot on! Exactly 1.25 grams which according to Shure is optimal for brush up. (I always use brush up because that damn thing sucks in more ways than one).
I find that I do not like the Vinyl Engine protractors. Too many extra lines and hard to read. I want to try the Baerwald I have from Shure which is much easier, but I don't know that my headshell has the room to move that cart forward enough. (It has a little but I fear it may not be enough).
I did attempt a SRA check and adjustment, but found you can not do that with the Shure M97xE because the body is built at an angle that makes it inpossible to even use shims.

I am now playing a classical record (Karajan Conducts Mozart Concertos) to test because you can't fool a classical record.
It's playing VERY WELL!!!!!! A bit laid back, but not nearly as much as before. I'm an AT95E or Ortofon 2m Bronze or perhaps even a Denon DL110 would blow the Shure out of the water. I'll be setting one of those up later, as in at least a couple of months. (I need to recover from this setup first).
With that Phonomena II and all it's fabulous!
I'm not hearing anything weird or even slightly off. It's CD quiet and fairly full sounding and everything.
Now to enjoy some records through my Paradigms!!!!!!:audiophile::exciting::D

~Eric
 
Playing America - Hideaway now and all is well and CD quiet again! No change which is a good thing!
 
Congrats, Eric and you are right it will get easier each time you do it. Plus the M97xe is one of the hardest cartridges I have set up to get a good line on the cantilever, but if you get it lined up straight to the center grip line you are pretty damn close. Were you able to check it with a lined index card for level and if so how close was it? The only way I found to get the Shure to have more life than you found is to run the resistance up to 62kohms and get the capacitance below 150pf. Other than that it is what it is and it does "play nice" with the many poorly mixed and recorded rock albums of the 70's and 80's. But on other genres it can be somewhat dull.
 
Congrats, Eric and you are right it will get easier each time you do it. Plus the M97xe is one of the hardest cartridges I have set up to get a good line on the cantilever, but if you get it lined up straight to the center grip line you are pretty damn close. Were you able to check it with a lined index card for level and if so how close was it? The only way I found to get the Shure to have more life than you found is to run the resistance up to 62kohms and get the capacitance below 150pf. Other than that it is what it is and it does "play nice" with the many poorly mixed and recorded rock albums of the 70's and 80's. But on other genres it can be somewhat dull.

Thank you Jack. I am getting some noise from the left speaker on some records and not on others. That tells me it's most likely dirt (unlikely, the way I clean records, but sometimes it takes more than one cleaning) or it's just the pressing. Other records are CD quiet and I hear no noise from either side.
The M97xE is a very hard cart to set up because you have to battle the way the body is designed and that damn brush in front. Even with it lock up, it still gets in the way somewhat.
When I aligned it I just went with getting the cantilever lined up with the middle line on the protractor A & B. I guess that is called the center grip line.
I did check it with a lined index card and it looks like it's tilted forward a bit, but the cart body is designed that way. It would take a ton of pieces of file folder to level it out. I did not want to do that because even if I could I'd never get it mounted correctly or aligned again. I prefer not to mess with things, it gets too expensive. (That's why I am practicing before I go to mounting the uber expensive 2M Bronze. I know there are carts out there that cost as much as new cars, but to me personally the 2M Bronze is the same price as those).
The only way I could think of getting the capacitance below 150pf is to rewire the turntable. (I won't be doing that). As to the resistance, I'd have to switch the phono preamp to MC which would not work with MM carts as far as I know. Besides, messing about with the settings like that will lead to frying the preamp or something wouldn't it?
The cart did ok on the classical record I put on. It wasn't as lifeless as it was before, but the M97xE is not known for being a dynamic cart.
Mine only has about 13 hours on it anyway, so it's not even broke in. Maybe it will change a bit after 30 hours although I don't know which direction it will change.
Anyway, I'll be listening to it for a couple of months and I'll try to remember to jot down some notes.
I'm rockin out to Petula Clark right now.:audiophile::)
~Eric
 
Eric, lining the cantilever up to the center grid line is the right way to go and slightly tilted forward or "tail up" will get you slightly more treble response than level or "tail down". As the native capacitance of the Phonomena is a little high to start with make sure that switch one is in the off position so that you are getting 200pf instead of 300pf. In that position you will be just inside of Shure's recommended capacitance. If you only have 13hrs on the cartridge then it will continue to open up more up to the 50 hr. mark. One way to speed that process up if you can do it with that TT is to find a "donor" LP and put it on before you go to work and let it run on repeat for a couple of days. Once the Shure breaks in you may find out you like it.
 
Eric,

You are a braver man than I. Congratulations. Thank you guys for helping Eric out.
 
Joe, the passion of vinyl as opposed to digital is that it is hands on. You can only learn by trying, failing and trying again until you get it right. It's the involvement in the process that makes vinyl different, plus the fact that pure analog vinyl has yet to be surpassed for the "in the moment" feeling. For example tonight I have gone from Dave Grohl's Sound City tribute LP to Etta James to Buckingham/Nicks to Fleetwood Mac Rumour's and they all sound superb and far better than any CD based system I have ever owned and that is a lot. When people from my son's generation get into vinyl and have the dealer set it up you are missing part of the experience. When you hear it you understand that it is better, but you weren't part of the process, which is important. Just my opinion from an "old guy."
 
You are absolutely right Jack; there is something uniquely divine and involving about vinyl that no other source playback device can equal.
...The process indeed, the rituals; the album's clean-up, the constant adjustment, the speed, the cartridge, the needle, the balance, the tonearm, the anti-vibration feet and platform, the anti-skating, all the brushes and liquids, the gun (anti-static), the level, your carpet (static), your chair (static), your speakers (feedback), the all ultra precise adjustments of all the parts (motor, belts, speed, cart, arm, etc.), the getting ups every 20 minutes, the record's flippings (side changes), the clean-ups again, and again, and again, of the albums, of the needle, the holding of the arm, the descente, the lift, the eye, the precise eye, the re-balancing, the readjusting, the clean-up, again, the getting-ups, the re-gaining access to your chair, the listening.

* For space savings I purposely omitted all the several terms used in all the adjustments of the tonearm and cartridge (vertical tracking, force, tangential line, horizontal azimuth, etc.). And I am not including the table itself, the motor, the belts tension, and the phono preamp (MM or MC), and the power cord and the interconnects and the restorer (RIAA curves and all).
 
Eric, lining the cantilever up to the center grid line is the right way to go and slightly tilted forward or "tail up" will get you slightly more treble response than level or "tail down". As the native capacitance of the Phonomena is a little high to start with make sure that switch one is in the off position so that you are getting 200pf instead of 300pf. In that position you will be just inside of Shure's recommended capacitance. If you only have 13hrs on the cartridge then it will continue to open up more up to the 50 hr. mark. One way to speed that process up if you can do it with that TT is to find a "donor" LP and put it on before you go to work and let it run on repeat for a couple of days. Once the Shure breaks in you may find out you like it.

Thank you Jack. I have the Phonomena set according to instructions for MM carts. I have the capacitance set at 200pf.
I don't want to speed up the process, there is no need. In my mind speeding up the process does more harm than good. Why not just let it naturally break in?:D
~Eric
 
Eric,

You are a braver man than I. Congratulations. Thank you guys for helping Eric out.

If you count scared to death of botching it and tragedy as brave then maybe so. Thanks Joe. This is the only way to learn it though and practice makes perfect. ~Eric
 
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