Sony PS-X800 (vinyl cheap and easy)

[lgo51]

vacuums are great, but that's down the road.

When I repair the newly found 16.5, I'll have a NG1 for sale - first dibs are yours if you like

a friend loaned me another phono stage, a substantially better one, in fact, the best one i've heard in my system and my little vinyl rig has no right to sound as good as it does--so much detail and information it's utterly mind boggling. the 1k load is what i've read as well.

...and the magic box is

[Stoffie]

Hey guys, found this while looking for another PS-X800 table.

I see some of you are looking for the user manual. I have mine scanned (not the greatest quality, but readable), so if you want it, pm me with your emailaddress and I'll send it to you

Just ordered a Denon DL-304 cart for mine, a step up from the DL-103 and DL-301mkII I was using up until now. Will be curious as to how much more wonderful the sound will get...

I have a bunch more vintage Sony gear that I love, but I won't bother you with that

Here's a money shot of mine...

[909]

When I repair the newly found 16.5, I'll have a NG1 for sale - first dibs are yours if you like...and the magic box is

thanks! let me know... the magic box is a proto phonostage from eddie current. it blew away the cambridge 640p.

Hey guys, found this while looking for another PS-X800 table.

I see some of you are looking for the user manual. I have mine scanned (not the greatest quality, but readable), so if you want it, pm me with your emailaddress and I'll send it to you

Just ordered a Denon DL-304 cart for mine, a step up from the DL-103 and DL-301mkII I was using up until now. Will be curious as to how much more wonderful the sound will get...

I have a bunch more vintage Sony gear that I love, but I won't bother you with that

Here's a money shot of mine...

we've got a little ps-x800 owners' club. yes, i'll send you my email address--thank you. please let us know, your impressions of the denons carts. i considered the 103, but thought it mated better with heavier arms.

great photo! looks to be in fantastic condition.

do you have any sony r2rs, walkmans, or discman?

[Stoffie]

Thanks! It pretty much IS immiculate. The previous owner cared for it as if it was his own child. It came with the original box, packing materials, owner manual, service manual, the transport screws, all the original plastic bags and baggies, the 45rpm adapter, the packing foam for the arm and transport mechanism, the original bill... truly exceptional. It did not have a single scratch on it.

It is simply the best turntable I have heard. Also have a PS-X75 biotracer that needs some work, but it sounded great as well when it was still working properly.

Will leave my impressions here of the new Denon cart. I had the 301 on there after using the 103 for a while (being a spare cart), and that sounded much more relaxed, open and detailed than the 103, but then the suspension died, and the needle went with it. So I still need to have that fixed sometime, if possible. Curious as to how the 304 will sound like after break-in, since it is a perfect match for my phono pre (headamp), impedance wise.

Don't really have any 'portable' Sony gear (well a '98 Discman, and a 2002 MZ-N10 MD aren't all that special...)

More fitting to this forum, I do have a pair of Telefunken TH-700 orthodynamic headphone, that I need to restore. The leather earpads have come off after some vandal left them in the sun for a couple of days once. They are in a box somewhere up in the attic, but I'd have to look for them. I really miss having some good headphone and these were great.

909: will send the manual to you as soon as I am at my own computer in a few hours!

[jp11801]

ghetto version of the 800 the ps-x500, nice table no motor noise but the arm can exhibit some noise particularly at the begining and end of lps. Overall a great table and easily as good as most regas and music hall or project tables.

[lgo51]

ghetto version of the 800 the ps-x500, nice table no motor noise but the arm can exhibit some noise particularly at the begining and end of lps. Overall a great table and easily as good as most regas and music hall or project tables.

How do you like the ZYX Bloom ? Think'n about that one myself.

[jp11801]

great cart,

i like their yatra cart bit better but the bloom easily outclasses the competition in its price class like the dyna 20x r even the shelter 501. I have owned both and consider the bloom an upgrade.

[909]

Thanks! It pretty much IS immiculate. The previous owner cared for it as if it was his own child. It came with the original box, packing materials, owner manual, service manual, the transport screws, all the original plastic bags and baggies, the 45rpm adapter, the packing foam for the arm and transport mechanism, the original bill... truly exceptional. It did not have a single scratch on it.

wow, you got it all. did you also get those two arm weights? i didn't get anything, but the tt. i've wish i would have also received the weights.

It is simply the best turntable I have heard. Also have a PS-X75 biotracer that needs some work, but it sounded great as well when it was still working properly.

very cool and glad to hear. i am feeling this tt a great deal. even though, it has been awhile i'd be surprised if my vpi was substantially better. and in fact, i remember the vpi being a bit dull and not as involving in comparison.

Will leave my impressions here of the new Denon cart... Curious as to how the 304 will sound like after break-in, since it is a perfect match for my phono pre (headamp), impedance wise.

can't wait. i am digging my DL-110-very happy with it.

909: will send the manual to you as soon as I am at my own computer in a few hours!

thanks for the manual!

ghetto version of the 800 the ps-x500, nice table no motor noise but the arm can exhibit some noise particularly at the begining and end of lps. Overall a great table and easily as good as most regas and music hall or project tables.

John looks very nice. Congrats!

[luvdunhill]

great cart,

i like their yatra cart bit better but the bloom easily outclasses the competition in its price class like the dyna 20x r even the shelter 501. I have owned both and consider the bloom an upgrade.

how did I miss this post? anyways, I have to add the gratuitous ZYX

[lgo51]

If anyone locates a suitable extra weight for balancing heavier carts that information would be most welcome.

Also, has anybody discovered the Effective Mass of the tonearm? I can not find that in the Sony literature and do not have a test record to do the empirical resonance determination to back into that variable. This would be very handy to help select cartridge compliance.

Cheers,

LarryO

[Stoffie]

The whole biotracer idea is that arm weight/cart weight/arm compliance is not a factor, the electronics compensate for everything. You can pretty much use anything on these things...

909: I did get the two arm weights. I could weigh them for you if you wanted, so you could have something made maybe ?

Still waiting for my DL-304...come on postman!

[lgo51]

The whole biotracer idea is that arm weight/cart weight/arm compliance is not a factor, the electronics compensate for everything. You can pretty much use anything on these things...

Yes, the PS-X800 certainly can and does adjust the arm Balance (VTF). In fact, it only adjusts the VTF upon; power-up, cue-in, and parking. I would be surprised to learn that it is able to alter the Effective Mass of the arm assembly which is determined by the physical weight and geometry of the assembly. It is the Effective Mass (not VTF) that interacts with the compliance of the cart's cantilever that determines the tonearm's resonance frequency. If one knows two of those variables, the third can be deduced. Targeting the broad range of 8 to 16 Hz as the resultant resonant frequency is considered desirable, with much debate about where in that range is optimal.

As nifty as the Sony table is, I must differ with your statement that;

...the electronics compensate for everything. You can pretty much use anything on these things.

Maybe I missed something; have the politicians moved to revoke Newtonian physics when we were not paying attention?

There's a nice tutorial here: http://www.theanalogdept.com/cartridge___arm_matching.htm

Cheers,

BTW: I *wouild* like to know what the add-on weights measure

[Stoffie]

I don't really have the in depth knowledge about compliance, arms and carts and how they interact, so I can't give any scientifically valid response to this

From the things I read about the biotracer technology, and things I have heard and read throughout the years, from owners of these tables, I does not seem to matter much what cart you use with it. It generally all sounds pretty damn good.

I've tried an Ortofon MC20, Denon DL-103, Denon DL-301 mk II and even some cheap AT cart, and all seem to sound really good on this table (and also on my PS-X75 biotracer), as long as it's setup right in the headshell. Next one to try is the Denon DL-304 (still waiting...).

I never meant to say it compensates for 'everything' the way you think of it. You know what I meant.

However, the arm is filled with velocity sensors and linear motors that compensate for the behaviour of the arm, and do a good attempt to eliminate feedback.

I can only say what my ears tell me, that this table sounds good with every cart I have tried up until now, which is what matters to me.

If I have the time to unpack the weights (they are in the original box, up in the attic), I will post their weight here for reference

[jp11801]

I can report that the biotracer on the ps-x500 mated with the xyz bloom sounds great and is a fine match

[909]

cool, that's always welcome news. where did you buy the xyz bloom?

[jp11801]

sora sound , Mehran is the man sent out the cart prior to my payment hius is one of the good guys on A-gon

[lgo51]

sora sound , Mehran is the man sent out the cart prior to my payment hius is one of the good guys on A-gon

He is indeed the best ZYX distributor, I thought I saw a post for just under $500 over on that other site.

I've just begun to break-in my Denon DL-160 cart on the Sony. Have not heard the 110 so can not compare the two, but even early into the process I'm liking some of the sound better than the Shure V15Vmr... but hoping the 'body' begins to bloom sometime soon. One obvious plus is the much lower groove noise, maybe that stylus shape IS better?

Cheers,

[jp11801]

I am on a sony DD vintage binge here is the ps-x7 table great sound I would put on par with my linn lp12 better in some areas and not as good in others.

When I get the supplies in I am looking at a three stage arm wire upgrade. The headshell tags, these are easy, an upgraded rca wire the stock are really crappy but the table has to be disassembled for that and the really tricky one would be a tone arm rewire with cardas 33 gauge wire. I could potentially skip stage 2 if I figured out a way to avoid going to the board with the wire and come straight out of the tone arm the rca connectors. This would avoid the solder joints to the pcb board and out for the pcb board.

[Voltron]

Cool pics. I like the second one -- kinda like the angle they used on the Batman TV show when they were at the super villain's lair.

[909]

John, you have gone Sony TT crazy. I am glad to hear that you

[lgo51]

The PS-1 is set to 1K, medium gain, subsonic filter and capacitance are both off.

I finally got up the nerve to measure the DL160 with my LCR meter, measured as: 405/410 uH and 158/158 R [L/R], and would suspect that your DL110 is quite similar.

A 1 kR load will just about exactly tame the rather large resonance at 500 kHz and yields just over 3 deg phase shift at 20 kHz, but it also robs the cart of about 1.2 dB (-13%) of output signal

Noodling around with the model, I settled on a value of about 4.7 kR as a good compromise; only about -0.3 dB (-3%) loss and a less than 1 deg phase shift at 20 kHz.

I liked the change, the 1 kR load seemed to damp the upper registers a bit too much for me. Maybe you could have a listen with a 4.7 - 5.1 kR load and tell us how it sounds to you?

BTW: What opamp chips are used in the PS-1 ?

Cheers,

[909]

the op-amps read OPA134PA. the ps-1 only offers load impedance at 47K, 10K, 1K, and 100 ohms.

[909]

and here's the HC-1b power supply for the PS-1.

[lgo51]

the op-amps read OPA134PA. the ps-1 only offers load impedance at 47K, 10K, 1K, and 100 ohms.

You might simply add another 10K resistor in parallel with the existing one for each channel [L/R]... maybe R1 and R22 if I guess right from your pix. Then select the 10K switch position for each channel. That way you do not have to remove the original resistors and could reverse the change if you did not care for it. Do you have a multimeter to check the values [cart unplugged] with?

[909]

You might simply add another 10K resistor in parallel with the existing one for each channel [L/R]... maybe R1 and R22 if I guess right from your pix. Then select the 10K switch position for each channel. That way you do not have to remove the original resistors and could reverse the change if you did not care for it. Do you have a multimeter to check the values [cart unplugged] with?

thanks for the suggestion. any modification has to wait until i get help because i don't have the skill to pull this off. no, i don't own a multimeter.