6moons Audio Reviews: Turntables.lt Black Stork

Transcript

2010.08.01 6moons audio reviews: turntables.lt Bla… This review page is supported in part by the sponsors whose ad banners are displayed below This review first appeared in the July 2010 issue of hi-end hifi magazine High Fidelity of Poland. You can also read this review of the turntable.lt Black Stork in its original Polish version. We publish its English translation in a mutual syndication arrangement with publisher Wojciech Pacula. As is customary for our own reviews, the writer's signature at review's end shows an e-mail address should you have questions or wish to send feedback. All images contained in this review are the property of High Fidelity or turntable.lt. Ed. Reviewer: Wojciech Pacuła CD player: Ancient Audio Lektor Air Phono preamp: RCM Audio Sensor Prelude IC Preamp: Leben RS-28CX Power amp: Luxman M-800A Integrated amp: Leben CS300 Loudspeakers: Harpia Acoustics Dobermann Headphones: AKG K701, Ultrasone PROLine 2500, Beyerdynamic DT-990 Pro 600 Ω Interconnects: CD-preamp Wireworld Gold Eclipse 52, preamp-power amp Velum NF-G SE, speaker cable Velum LS-G Power cords: Acrolink Mexcel 7N-PC9100 (CD) and 2 x Acrolink Mexcel 7N-PC7100 (preamp, power amp) Power conditioning: Gigawatt PF-2 Filtering Power Strip audio stand Base 6moons.com/…/blackstork.html 1/5 2010.08.01 6moons audio reviews: turntables.lt Bla… Resonance control: Finite Elemente Ceraball under the CD, turntables change continuously, as do cartridges Review component retail: €4.000 table, €4.600 arm 6moons.com/…/blackstork.html 2/5 2010.08.01 6moons audio reviews: turntables.lt Bla… A turntable is about mechanics and electronics – well, mostly mechanics. To design a good turntable requires knowledge of both micro mechanics and electronics. But, to get good sound also requires high-quality records. That's probably why most quality turntables used to come from the UK, the US and Germany. This ‘rule’ no longer applies as strictly as it once did—one of the best decks in the world comes from the Australian Continuum Audio Labs—but the companies with the most experience of complex deck/tone arm/cartridge combos still tend to be British, American and German. They generally enjoy a clear advantage over their competitors (I shouldn’t forget another exception, the French Verdier company). While manufacturers in Eastern Europe had sufficient knowledge of both mechanics and electronics all along, they did not have easy access to high-quality pressings. This limited what could be achieved by (among others) Polish turntables. I'm not saying that those were poor products but that even very specific upgrades couldn’t elevate their basic sound quality to a higher level. So there was no justification to keep making them. Surely there also were other reasons why Bernard, Daniel and Unitra's decks with simple tone arms were our domestic top achievements but the truth is, they were our best. Considering circumstances, these actually were fine achievements for Polish manufacturers and I personally owned Unitra's GS-464 as my first real turntable and still remember its sound. But it wasn’t top shelf, just good enough then. 6moons.com/…/blackstork.html 3/5 2010.08.01 6moons audio reviews: turntables.lt Bla… Out of the blue one fine day I then get a note from I think Srajan at 6moons who had learned about a Lithuanian company making expensive high-end turntables. I don't know who of us was more shocked but without delay, I visited their website turntables.lt (it’s also the arguably not quite catchy brand name). Quelle surprise! Their tone arms caught my attention almost immediately, looking like clearly wonderful designs with certain details known only from the most expensive solutions on the market. At first glimpse they did seem to look like DaVinci arms but I later learned that they were proprietary. Surely certain solutions were inspired by pre-existing designs but that’s progress. You don't have to start from scratch. You can make existing things better. After all, this is more of a cumulative science branch as Physics is to math, not facultative like Polish philology. After a short email exchange with the Lithuanian designers, everything got set up. I was to receive a turntable plus arm in six months - as long as it would take to get CE approval. Half a year later, I would finally shake hands with the two gents in charge, Jonas Jakutis and Vidmautas Triukas who visited me from Kovno. As I mentioned in my April issue editorial, the meeting was very enjoyable socially and professionally and my guests turned out to be k ewl dudes so to speak. We had a long conversation in Russian, English and Polish, a great time together and then they left. Alas they left behind a small souvenir next to my Base rack - the Black Stork turntable with its own integrated base similar to what’s offered by Transrotor, Acoustic Solid or Clearaudio. This one was equipped with three tone arms: a Reed 3Q, a Reed 2P and a Reed 2A, all of them 12 inches long (9" and 10.5" versions exist as well). 6moons.com/…/blackstork.html 4/5 2010.08.01 6moons audio reviews: turntables.lt Bla… Sound. Records used during this review - Freddie Hubbard, Open Sesame, Blue Note/Classic Records, 4040, 200g LP; Gerry Mulligan & Thelonious Monk, Mulligan Meets Monk , Riverside/Analogue Productions, 1106, 2 x 180g, 45 rpm LP; Kraftwerk, Autobahn, Capital Records/KlingKlang/Mute Records, STUMM 303, 180g LP (2009); Kraftwerk, Tour The France Soundtrack s, EMI Records, 591 708 1, 2 x 180g LP; Led Zeppelin, Mothership, Atlantic Records, R1 34470, 4 x 180g LP; Nirvana, Unplugged in New York , Geffen/Universal Music/Original Recordings Group, ORG 034, 180g LP; John Coltrane, Giant Steps, Atlantic/Rhino, R1 512581, 2 x 45 rpm LP; Frank Sinatra, Sinatra & Strings, Warner Music/Mobile Fidelity, MFSL 1-313, No. 199, 180g LP; Yamamoto, Tsuyoshi Trio, Midnight Sugar, Three Blind Mice/Cisco Music, TBM23-45, 45 rpm, 2 x 180g LP; Electric Light Orchestra, Time, Jet Records, JET LP 236, LP; Depeche Mode, Wrong, Mute Records, 12BONG40, maxi-SP; J. S. Bach, The Work s of Johann Sebastian Bach. IX. Research Period, Archive Production, ARC 3162, LP; Boney M., Tak e The Heat Of Me, Hansa International, 65 201, LP; Boney M., Ocean Of Fantasy, Hansa, 200 888-320, LP. 6moons.com/…/blackstork.html 5/5 2010.08.02 6moons audio reviews: turntables.lt Bla… This review page is supported in part by the sponsors whose ad banners are displayed below Let’s start with the tone arm or rather, the material it’s made of. There are a number of available versions. The main difference is the wand material. I received two versions - Panzerholz and Western Red Cedar (there’s also carbon fiber). Mostly I used the Red Cedar but I did exchange it for the composite wood arm during certain sessions. While I harboured early doubts that wand materials would be that audible, they vanished. When Jonas and Vidmantas explained how their wooden arm worked, they confirmed their opinion that American Red Cedar was best even though my assumption was that the harder more rigid ‘tank wood’ should be superior. After listening I realized that the Lithuanians were right. Cedar made the sound far more attractive than any other wand option. I don't just mean a different sound as one might expect. The sonic changes were more profound than merely a change in tonal balance (which was part of it too of course). For one, the Cedar wand was quieter. A friend who’d had opportunity to listen to the Transrotor Argos and Bergmann Audio Sindre during my reviews of them felt that with the Black Stork, instruments were less real and not as well differentiated – despite the fact that these two decks ran AirTight's PC1 cartridge and the Stork the absolutely brilliant Supreme version of the same cart. I understood him up to a point. Yes the Bergmann offered a more open sound with better resolution just as the Black Stork did with the Panzerholz arm. Yes the Sindre delivered a bit more precise sound where particular layers were emphasized stronger. Still, in my opinion the Lithuanian turntable presented the same material more natural – more how I remember my listening session with the mighty Argos. This opinion of mine concerns the turntable.lt with the ‘less resolved’ Cedar arm. 6moons.com/…/blackstork_2.html 1/4 2010.08.02 6moons audio reviews: turntables.lt Bla… Not to confuse you, I should point out that the Cedar arm offers a dense, somewhat dark but very well balanced sound. Here dark doesn’t mean a curtailed or withdrawn treble. This reminds me of Acrolink's 7N-PC9300 power cord. In general it makes the sound a bit dark and the tonal balance seems to move more into the shade - until some instrument in the upper bands present amazing, perfectly controlled attacks with brilliant reverberations. Usually such a sound is called vibrant. Today’s point is not about phenomena of particular moments but a permanent, very fundamental and consistent feature of the sound. The sudden appearance of a cymbal strike after what one thought of as a piece of dark sounds catches one off guard. One couldn’t see it coming. This was even more special with the Lithuanian table because groove noise was so very low. I’ve only encountered such low stylus noise with the Argos and in my friend's system with the SME30. And for context, the above turntables distinguish even better what's music and what's noise/distortion than the Lithuanian. Altogether my time with this Eastern European table netted a very well balanced sound that was tonally extremely rich. Not everybody will love this but one can use another arm to get a more energetic extended bass. The Cedar arm offers the best bass quality. That was easily heard on the Depeche Mode single Oh, well or Boney M. records. The aural continuity was amazing and credit should go to both tone arm and deck. The latter offers surprisingly good quality and almost no impact on the sound to, in a sense, subtract itself from the equation. The Argos and SME are still better in this regard but the Lithuanian table definitely offered more than what I expected from such a simple design. I'm pretty confident that the men from Kaunas will find room for improvements but I already admire what they achieved very much. 6moons.com/…/blackstork_2.html 2/4 2010.08.02 6moons audio reviews: turntables.lt Bla… The sound is very coherent throughout. This of course is some sort of approximation because while listening to Coltrane’s Giant Steps, we all realize that this is not the real live sound of instruments. Instead microphones were placed very closely, the virtual position of each instrument on stage was decided on by the sound engineer and not the actual placement in the studio during recording sessions. But as soon as during listening we accept something as real, it becomes the recreation of a real event even if particular tones are more casual and less interconnected than they should be. With audio ‘real’ equates to ‘continuity’. You must get used to it and recognize it. You simply can't compare live concerts with what you hear from loudspeakers. By definition those are two separate worlds. 6moons.com/…/blackstork_2.html 3/4 2010.08.02 6moons audio reviews: turntables.lt Bla… Still, we should look for sonic ‘truth’ to tell us whether a particular audio system is closer to it. The Lithuanian turntable came very close. To achieve that, it followed its own path quite similar to another device I had a chance to listen to – the Hansen Audio Prince v2 speakers. Those offered a similarly dark sound (in a very positive meaning of the word) that conveyed a fantastic experience without trying to be best at bass extension, spacing, transparency and so forth. These devices don't even have to try because they commence from such a high level that’s beyond what many competitors will ever achieve even under the best of circumstances. Somewhat later into this game, you might realize that in fact some compromises were made for the greater good. Perhaps some resolution was sacrificed to get better coherence. Whilst comparing this aspect, you might find the Bergmann a bit more detailed and better at differentiating low-frequency tones. And it’s true. These are the advantages of the Sindre. 6moons.com/…/blackstork_2.html 4/4 2010.08.02 6moons audio reviews: turntables.lt Bla… This review page is supported in part by the sponsors whose ad banners are displayed below But if we consider the sound as a whole that should deliver a respite for our minds and souls in the form of a magical experience, then we must admit that the Black Stork does a marvelous job. Yet I should also say that it lacks a bit of resolution. While the deck was able to show differences between tone arms very easily, the turntable/arm combo was able to show differences between the Air Tight PC-1 Supreme and Miyajima Laboratories Waza pickups almost instantaneously. This quick comparison was possible not because this turntable allowed me to analyse separate sonic aspects but rather, because it delivered the final verdict almost at once. In this respect it was an absolutely extraordinary device. Sure, certain things could still be improved—the SME30 offers better dynamics, the Sindre better resolution—but considering the Black Stork's price, it’s a great value already. Description: The designers of the turntables.lt company Jonas Jakutis and Vidmantas Triukas live in Kaunas/Lithuania. 6moons.com/…/blackstork_3.html 1/7 2010.08.02 6moons audio reviews: turntables.lt Bla… Both are engineers with several years of study at the Kaunas Science Institute. When deciding to design a turntable, they had to choose from a number of applicable philosophies. The most common one says that you must decouple plinth from motor; or apply enough mass to convert vibrations to heat. Otherwise unwanted resonance finds its way into the stylus. Once again the most common solution is to build a tone arm that dissipates such vibrations as quickly as possible and, via mechanical connection, ‘dumps’ them to ground. In suspended designs by Linn and Thorens, this can't be done in the same way so they must increase platter weight to suppress vibrations and run a soft suspension that feeds back less energy to the stylus. This can be accomplished quite easily in heavy decks but there always tend to be vibrations that end up with the needle. Even very low amplitudes are bothersome considering the size of the groove. That’s why carbon-fibre arms have become so popular. Their material transfers vibrations very quickly and alters their makeup. The Lithuanian designers decided to damp vibrations from the start. It’s why their tone arms are wooden. As real engineers, they applied science. They first built a device that would show them just how vibrations travel through the wood in amplitude and time. They sought a material with a clearly expressed resonant frequency whose sound damping characteristics were close to the exponential function. A few types of wood survived these rigorous inspections and carried over into the listening session phase. 6moons.com/…/blackstork_3.html 2/7 2010.08.02 6moons audio reviews: turntables.lt Bla… Here the winner emerged as American Red Cedar but a few others remained as viable customer options. How was the tone arm bearing solved? As a gimbaled design on carbide points whose first prototype was based on a Polish Unitra arm but used different materials. The bearing, offset angle and carbide point shape all evolved from the Polish precursor however. The Reed tone arm is based not only on technical and acoustic analysis but also audiophile suggestions. The base is made of steel. It is screwed to a brass housing that might be finished in gloss or matte gold or other options. The base differs between the three arm models. The most expensive 3Q integrates a laser mechanism for VTA adjustment and 6moons.com/…/blackstork_3.html 3/7 2010.08.02 6moons audio reviews: turntables.lt Bla… azimuth. Unlike in most tone arms, azimuth adjustment is not realized via wand movement but in the head shell. There is logic behind it as turning the wand changes more than just azimuth since the axis of the turn is not perpendicular to the stylus or cantilever but the arm. The Lithuanian solution makes their head shell design more complex but worth the effort. The head shell is made of Titanium or aluminum. The less expensive tone arm version still has the VTA adjustment mechanism but drops the laser support. The least expensive arm lacks the on-the-fly VTA adjustment. The arm suspension is on semi-spherical cardan points with a sapphire thrust pad. The counterweight is made of steel. There are two elements. The bigger one offsets the center of gravity at the level of the stylus and can be moved along the wand. It has an additional element which can be screwed in or out for super-precise downforce adjustment. The arm also sports an anti-skating lever mechanism supported by sapphire bearings (another idea sourced from Unitra). The wiring is based on silver-plated C37 copper and can be terminated with WBT or Eichmann Bullet. Build quality, finish and design are outstanding. The table itself looks quite ordinarily. It's a decoupled design realized differently from the norm. Large metal elements are fixed to the base with bushings at the top that each receive a rubber ball (one chooses from different balls for compliance adjustments). Then one places a square-section steel triangle with round corner elements atop to level the device. This tripod then receives a granite or marble shelf that weighs around 14kg. Here we find the platter’s oil bearing. 6moons.com/…/blackstork_3.html 4/7 2010.08.02 6moons audio reviews: turntables.lt Bla… The platter itself is a massive 12kg affair consisting of three layers – non-magnetic steel, a composite core with belt groove and a metal top. A sort of brown velour finishes off the platter which looks great. As the platter’s diameter exceeds a 12-inch record, it’s quite difficult to separate vinyl from mat especially whilst changing sides without interrupting platter rotation. The table is equipped with a 6moons.com/…/blackstork_3.html 5/7 2010.08.02 6moons audio reviews: turntables.lt Bla… The table is equipped with a slide-bearing synchronous motor (250 rpm speed) with mechanical on/off switch. Speed changes are manual. In my view a high-end turntable deserves electronic speed changes and a soft start function (here there is an audible click over the speakers when the motor spins up). Luckily this can be addressed by future upgrades. The round drive belt is made of white rubber. The motor is placed in a steel cylinder that weights 4 kg and sits on three rubber absorbers. The overall design is quite solid and shows great attention to detail even though my review loaner still looked a bit rough because it was the first production piece ever. We should probably call it a very late prototype. The entire turntable with base weights 86kg. Complete technical details can be found here. Technical data (according to the manufacturer): Belt-drive Speed: 33 1/3, 45 RPM Speed variance: +/- 0.2% S/N ratio: 80dB Synchronous Crouzet motor 230 V/50-60 Hz Power consumption: 3.5W Platter weight: 12kg Turntable weight: 86kg Dimensions: 1080 x 485 x 450mm 6moons.com/…/blackstork_3.html 6/7 2010.08.02 6moons audio reviews: turntables.lt Bla… opinia @ highfidelity.pl turntables.lt website 6moons.com/…/blackstork_3.html 7/7