£500 to make my vinyl sound better - suggestions please

[Charlie Jefferson]

I have oft posted something similar to this, but now I'm ready to spend.

What's the best route with £500 at my disposal?

Or should I forsake marginal improvements and splash out on stash of vinyl?

Phono amp? Cart? Neither?

 

[Charlie Jefferson]

I have oft posted something similar to this, but now I'm ready to spend.

What's the best route with £500 at my disposal?

Or should I forsake marginal improvements and splash out on stash of vinyl?

Phono amp? Cart? Neither?

Forgot to include details of current equipment not listed below.

Phono amp: Musical Fidelity X-LPS v8

Cartridge: Goldring 2400

 

[floyd droid]

Option 1, save more money then post again .

Option 2, buy a stash of vinyl, which blows Option 1 into the weeds,lol.

 

[chebby]

Does the Goldring 2500 replacement stylus fit your 2400 cartridge body? (It looks like it should.)

The stylus upgrade would cost about £204 leaving £300 for LPs.

 

[lindsayt]

If you sold your Roksan Radius for half its current RRP you'd have about £700. £700 to £1200 would be enough to buy you a wide range of turntable and arm combinations that would be contenders for sounding better than your Radius. I recommend you get together with a few other vinyl enthusiasts and compare your record player against theirs and buy whatever you like most. If you find none that you prefer then keep the Radius and buy more vinyl.

 

[shropshire lad]

Spend it all on wacky - baccy . That should make even your worst LPs sound amaaazing ! Only problem is , once it's all gone you are back to where you are now .

Selling your existing turntable sounds like a backwards step to me , as you would have less money available than a new Radius would cost and I reckon you would have to spend at least £1500.00 to improve on what you have got .

I reckon you need to keep saving to make significant improvements , so spend a bit of it on some new records and keep putting the pennies in the pot .

I'm just about to start saving a similar amount for some sort of headphone amp .

 

[lindsayt]

You can get better turntable motor units than the Roksan Radius for £100. There are lots of turntable and arm combinations that you can buy for less than £700 that would sound better than the Radius. It wouldn't be a backward step changing the Radius for one of these. It would be a zero cost upgrade. All you need is a fully working, properly engineered idler or direct drive with a good arm.

 

[Charlie Jefferson]

Spend it all on wacky - baccy . That should make even your worst LPs sound amaaazing ! Only problem is , once it's all gone you are back to where you are now .

Selling your existing turntable sounds like a backwards step to me , as you would have less money available than a new Radius would cost and I reckon you would have to spend at least £1500.00 to improve on what you have got .

I reckon you need to keep saving to make significant improvements , so spend a bit of it on some new records and keep putting the pennies in the pot .

I'm just about to start saving a similar amount for some sort of headphone amp .

My days of narcotic inhalation are well and truly over. Can just about manage a couple of bottles of beer on a good night, so the former buying option is a no no.

I really want to keep the turntable and as I'm a real Luddite with anything technical I can't foresee purchasing new arms/motors either. One day when I've got more cash to splash I will buy another deck. For now it seems my upgrade options are fairly limited. Time to buy some more vinyl and maybe the Goldring cart upgrade, as suggested by Chebby.

Thanks everyone.

 

[Al ears]

If you sold your Roksan Radius for half its current RRP you'd have about £700. £700 to £1200 would be enough to buy you a wide range of turntable and arm combinations that would be contenders for sounding better than your Radius. I recommend you get together with a few other vinyl enthusiasts and compare your record player against theirs and buy whatever you like most. If you find none that you prefer then keep the Radius and buy more vinyl.

He could do this but just go and try it. I have been trying to sell an original radius for months - at £600 and nobody is buying! I would therefore suggest keeping it and upgrading cartridge. There isn't a lot more you can do unless he wants to go down the route of buying a second hand Tabriz (not a bad idea I feel) then flogging the Nima tonearm for which he may get approx. £350...................... sorry charly just read your post above..........forget the Tabriz then!

 

[Charlie Jefferson]

Thank you all.

The cash, still burning a hole in my pocket, is accompanying me to a record fair today. Well, at least a fifth of it. Component and/or tweakery upgrades on hold once more in favour of some music.

Last month at the fair I was fairly restrained, thinking i might be spending on my deck or peripherals, so today I can browse and buy a little more freely.

That said, is it just me, but when I've got some cash I often return empty handed and when I'm on a tighter budget I come back heavy laden with a stack of stuff.