Dear Friends, thank you for your time again :-D We are back with another hotly suggested turntable to be reviewed: the US$450 Fluance RT84 that now comes with the 2M Blue (instead of the previous 2M Red). I thought the Rega P1 will clearly get beat this time with its stock Carbon cartridge also priced at the same $450 in North America.
Lo and behold.......the latter won. I guess we are all shocked, or maybe rather not, as the experienced vinylists had told us before: that a great tonearm is really tantamount to superb resolution and playback performance, above having a costly cartridge, a thick plinth, and of course, the marketing hype (your 5 stars, awards, and skewed reviews due to the influence of goodwill and sponsorships).
I believe you friends will do the same for me, as I would do for you: honesty, spending your own money to buy equipment for reviews, and avoiding all forms of monetary rewards.
Remember, this is a hobby we all hold dear. Don't spoil it! :-D We need stonkingly great equipment (and affordable) to enjoy our vinyl music!!!
My family and I have been busy lately with the Diwali festivities with our fellow Indian Singaporeans, and helping an Indian neighbour who had just newly moved in! Moko is in the thick of action too. She is recovering very well after intensive rehabilitation physiotherapy sessions after the operation on her Right Hind Leg (Cranial Cruciate Ligament rupture sustained in June). Thank you to some of you friends' well wishes!!! Woof woof!!! :-D
...Warmest regards to all of you dearest buddies and friends!!!
*Background :-)
Dearest Friends and Buddies,
I am Ian and I reside in sunny Singapore. I love our Vinyl Community and Vinyl Music. Vinyl analogue playback is utterly blissful, and I want for fellow friends and buddies to engage in vinyl music for many, many years in their life, each vinyl buddy through their school life, through the hustle and bustle of daily work, accompany them through precious hours at home with their family members or in their hostel with their friends. Vinyl music is blissful, free of time smear, phase shift, pre-ring and post-ring that plagues digital playback. Vinyl buddies and friends can all attest to that. It is not warm in the “bassy warm” sense, it is not soothing in the sense that “everything gets smoothed out”. It is because it is analogue, very detailed, calm, invigorating, enthralling, dynamic, refreshing. In a word, blissful. Utterly :-D
I want for all to get the very equipment that will get us there. These equipment, I firmly believe, are present, and existent, even at affordable price points!..and I started off in Dec 2015 hunting out for them, selling off my own Rega RP6 (which my wife and I loved) to fund the first batch of cartridges for review: the 5 cartridges in Group A ($70-$80), and the 7 cartridges in Group B ($90-$130). Subsequently I told myself to set aside $500-$1000 per month from my monthly salary to buy equipment to review. My own money. Quite a hefty sum monthly, significant to me, as I am a salaried man. This is my commitment. I believe in every field, there are people who have to make the sacrifice to pursue their love for the greater good, and to serve, the community of friends. I have also downsized my car in mid-2017 so as to commit these monies to fund these projects. I totally, rigorously, and kindly reject all forms of donations, be they from friends, from retailers, from manufacturers. This is a hobby, and my teachers and advisors in life have advised me that to bring balance to life, and to be wholesome, one will engage in a livelihood (daily job or business) that earns the monies, and one will also simultaneously engage in a hobby/service in life that is non-competitive, non-monetarily-remunerative. My wife totally understands what I want to do for the community and she so kindly supports my decision and efforts. Vinyl music is a lovely hobby I hold dearly. Friends and buddies are my ultimate responsibility and my love. I want the very best for them, and to provide totally honest reviews. Moles exist in hifi forums, moles also exist from benefactors who donate. I do not want to remotely encounter any moles masquerading as benefactors donating to my cause, only to find out sooner or later that such donations were/are from certain manufacturers or retailers. Everybody will do things differently. I want to maintain my status as a common-folk, aspire always to adopt the Shokunin spirit: of spending the utmost diligent care, through unhurried work, never caring for returns, in perfecting their work for the community. The personal satisfaction of getting to the very best equipment in each price class to help all my lovely buddies and friends is, the only thing, in store for me :-D We toast to the joy and bliss of vinyl analogue music. Vinyl Music deserves our love and attention. Our listening. Our care.
Let's go, buddies and friends!!!
Warmest Regards,
~ ian :-D