They did, no matter who actually manufactured the drivers - which doesn't really matter anyway.

B&W were one of the top speaker manufacturers, and some of their early speakers used EMI 13x8 units - still sounded great though.

I'll just stick with a replacement stylus and when I can afford it, buy a better turntable. I'll keep the rest of this system though, been playing some CDs and it sounds incredible!

Real hi-fi is always something worth having if you value your music

And as you've found, it doesn't have to be expensive either.

This is what my life has been missing. I can't turn it off!

Ah, another one who'll end up remortgaging his house to get it sounding "just that little bit better"

j/k, good to see another conversion to the fold

I was the same.

I had a Technics separates systems from the 80s for many years, but made the move to modern systems in the 2000s selling the old HIFI.

But I missed it, and the sound quality, so ended up scouring second hand shops and Ebay.

I now own the same system I owned back then, but with the added bonus of a black wooden HIFI cabinet with glass doors and glass lid, all in first class condition bought for a total of £50 on Ebay.

A stylus can easily be checked with a small microscope.

Glad you were successful in your search.
I bought a hifi system in the early seventies, a Philips 309 tuner/amp, turntable and Goodmans speakers set me back more than £150, a lot of money in those days.
The tuner/amp lasted until a couple of years ago, then blew an output transistor, so I bought this 1980s Leak 2000 tuner/amp on eBay for thirty quid.
It's the youngest component in this set-up apart from the second hand iPod and an adapter from the USA.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=06jp__aN0gE

Fantastic reproduction. Lots of quality but "unfashionable" equipment finds its way onto eBay.

Cheers.

It took almost a year, patiently searching Ebay every couple of days and the charity and second hands shops every few weeks. When I saw it on Ebay I was over the moon, but kept checking and checking to see if anybody else had bid. I was lucky, at the time there were so many Technics systems and components of various ages and quality on Ebay that this one seemed to slip through the net, I bid the starting £50 price 30 seconds before it ended and won it. Had to pay a friend petrol money to drive from Yorkshire to Manchester to collect it though, but well worth it in the end. It turned out to be in superb condition, and had been very well looked after. The turntable had rarely been used, but came with a spare belt and spare stylus too which was a bonus.

That's eBay for you. It amazes me that with some items there are several similar on offer, but occasionally a couple of bidders get themselves into a "locked horns" situation which pushes the price of one up to a ridiculous level when either of them could have scrolled down a page and found another that eventually sells at a fraction of the price.

If you can be patient with eBay, you can usually get something at a decent price.

One of my interests is vinyl jukeboxes (I've two) which I bought on eBay for very low prices, but I've seen similar models go for daft prices.

Can you believe it, my Fisher turntable broke! The auto return function didn't work, as the part attached to the arm inside had slipped and needed tightening. Due to the poor design, as I tightened it, only a little I may add, it snapped!

I super glued it earlier today, it worked briefly and, after more tweaking, broke again. I will leave it to glue overnight, if it works tomorrow, hooray! If not, I will buy that aforementioned Technics SLBD20.

Oh why must I tinker?

You're a bloke right? It's what blokes do. Show a bloke something with screws holding it together and there is this irresistible need to get a screwdriver out and undo the screws "just to see what's inside"

If the glue holds, the original issue will be fixed. If the glue doesn't hold, like it didn't earlier, it's broken forever and I'm a terrible person.

I do this all the time, but this is probably the first time it's gone horribly wrong.

Can you strengthen it (by adding a piece of metal to it).

A real man would fashion a replacement part from the box of bits in his shed.

If you are going to spend over the years 100s of pounds on vinyl I would concentrate on the turntable, buy the best you can and put up with (for now) lower quality reproduction.

Reason - a cheap turntable will track extremely heavily and will quite quickly grind out the groove, removing large proportions of the audio spectrum, especially at the top end. When the day comes that you buy your top end turntable and hi-fi set you could be disappointed with the result.

In the 70s I invested in a Pioneer PL12D turntable, the best I could afford, even though I had a cheap amp and speakers. My vinyl collection loves me for it.

It's not as if the PL12D was anything 'wonderful', it was only a budget turntable - but a highly respected one for the price.

If we're talking tracking weights perhaps I better not mention a disco we did once (decks were SP25 mkIII's - standard disco decks), it was upstairs with an incredibly bouncy floor.

To minimise skipping we moved as far as we could into a corner - but still had to balance 10p coins on the pickup head (florins back then) to stop continual jumping

PL12D's were a step up from the SP25 mkIII's, but not by much, some pretty good systems used SP25's.

It works-ish. The auto stop and auto start is iffy, but I can get it to play records!
I'm gunna keep my eye out for a player in the £50-£100 range. No rush, but will be looking for a bargain.

ROTEL RP310 BELT DRIVE TURNTABLE ORTOFON CARTRIDGE AND STYLUS

this is £75, or make an offer, any good?

Sounds a lot of money for an old turntable - was it even that much when new?.

Not sure that just because it's old it's worthless. Old thorens still cost a great deal.

I've found a Rotel 1500 for £50. It needs a new belt, but apart from that, should be fine. Is this a good deal? It looks wonderful and I've been told Rotel are very good.

Thorens were one of the top turntable manufacturers, and had a VERY high reputation


Rotel were only a 'middling' brand name, and most of their reputation was for amplifiers (which were generally fairly good), I don't recall them ever having any sort of reputation for turntables though?.

Ah I see. Perhaps I was misinformed then. Still my search for a cheap turntable continues!

So my DIY fix broke again, I need a turntable asap!

I'm looking at some cheaper makes like prosound or an old Garrard. £50 is the sort of area we're talking. Am I wasting my time? Or should I go for the Technics SLBD20 at £50?

My Thorens is sitting in the cupboard complete with Hadcock arm.