Musician/Audiophile System: Kind of a budget-retro theme

[TitaniumTroy]

https://www.stereophile.com/content/musicians-audiophiles-david-smith

I've heard the Altec 604's before in a vintage production speaker, I thought the highs were rather harsh.

Any thoughts on the Rek-O-Kut B-12H turntable/Shield RP-12 tonearm (Gray 108 clone)/Denon 103R cartridge. I'm not into vinyl anymore but I would say that Frankenstein looking tonearm is truly frightening, not to mention heavy looking.

 

[MakeMineVinyl]

You're right; the 604 is harsh sounding, but so are my A-7-500s in their natural state. Its all in the crossover which requires some equalization to smooth out the efficiency hump from about 500 Hz to around 3kHz. I don't know exactly what the Big Red crossover does, but I would assume it addresses this issue to some extent.

I wouldn't let my records anywhere near that turntable! Perhaps (hopefully) he is using it to play vintage records from the days when tracking forces were measured in ounces rather than grams. The majority of my system could be considered "vintage" too, and the guy is correct; gear from that era is just as good or better than what can be bought now. Audio technology was already mature in the 1950s, and aside from digital encoding, there is little which is new or better. Of course marketing types and evangelists would scream that that isn't true, but I'm afraid that is is very true.