Yeah, I think Brunswick and Victor were amongst the first to offer electrical driven turntables with electric amplification. Edison's first was the C-1 etc range of phono-radio combos. A portable made in Germany by Dual has a motor that was both spring driven and electrically driven, and 2 reproduces were supplied for accoustic or electrical playback. I've got a HMV 122 from 1939 that has a spring motor and electric pick up designed for use with battery radios, and a Paillard with electric motor and accoustic reproduction, so there was a variety of choices once electrical recording and reproduction came into being.
ah techmoan. may be weird. but you have legit helped me mentally with your content. you give me a distraction from a depression i have that i can barley control. and your videos along with 8bit guys have helped me find a hobby. i now collect and fix all sorts of tech. and im a complete audiophile thanks to you. used to he fine with dollar store headphones. now im rocking 50$ Hesh 3s cause i cant stand bad audio now. so thank you. so much. im so glad your channel exists. and im so glad to be here apart of it.
So I looked up what an "audiophile" is, and it means "a hi-fi enthusiast". You coulda just said that, because I thought you meant like you had an ASMR fetish.
I had a very similar gramaphone back in the 70s when I was a teenager. I had to search out 78s as that was the only speed it played. As a result I ended learning about Gershwin and Berlin, Big Band, Classical and Jazz that my friends had never heard of. Quite the musical education and all because I was fascinated by an old gramaphone!
I have a stand-up unit with a similar hand crank, and it can fill the house with music! It even has volume adjustment via doors that cover the internal horn.
Modern record players haven't really changed since the late 1980s/early 90s. What they are making today is basically copies of what was available then, with the addition of digitization for user convenience. And the digitization in most of the cheap, Chinese players isn't that good, and the software they come with is often outdated. Most laptop computers can do the job better.
@SevelRomanov They need the preamp to drive the digital converter anyway, it works much better with a line level input than what the cartridge itself provides.
I remember the HMV 102 from my nursery school in 1960 when I was 4 years old. I was fascinated with the ritual of winding and needle changing. The teacher would play us 'Nellie the Elephant' which was the class favourite.
My grandmother bought one of these for my mum some time around 1940, which she used to play "Nellie the Elephant" on to my sister in the early 60s. It is still around somewhere. I will have to look for it. When I was a kid I used to be fascinated by how it worked without electricity. This would have been in the early 50s, and by then my dad who was a bit of a gadget freak already had an electric HMV. I used to love opening the little draw and sorting all the needles!
I actually started out becoming an audiophile, but as I sought more authentic historical recordings I became interested in acoustical technology. It has become a passion of mine for nearly 40 years now! (78’s and wax cylinders!)
This summer I was listening to a 101 that has been stored in my uncle house for ages. It was still working perfectly and I was surprised on how well it sounded. Amazing things!
@@NOWtheband A number of very respected health professionals. In fact all of the ones not receiving money from the Bill and Melinda Foundation. Have a look at Health Impact News.
That's how copyright works? Usually expires 50~100 years after the copyright owners death, however it depends what part of the world the claim is in...
@@Fifury161 Indeed, sadly and mainly thanks to disney that's now the case. It use to be immediately after said death.... then after a few years and now up to 70yrs after death
@@Fifury161 The US will likely increase it, soon. Disney has a lot of lobbying power and a death-grip on that mouse. Mind you, right now they're maintaining all those huge theme parks with precisely 0 customers coming through the doors, that can't be cheap.
Honestly 78s are pretty dope in my opinion. Course they have big issues such as the records actually being able to shatter, and degradation but heck they seem fun to mess around with.
I obtained an HMV wind-up portable many years ago, and recall being amazed at the volume it delivered - ('put a sock in it' as you say), and in fact some of the 1950s 78 rpm discs contained enough energy within the grooves to bounce off the pick-up when played on a modern record deck. Many thanks for an informative and enjoyable video.
That takes me back. Being born in 74, I was allowed to play unfettered with one of these. The sight of all the plated fittings took me right back! Jimmy Shand was all I had to play using rose thorns from the garden as a needle! Thanks for a great Trip down Memory lane 👍😀
@@SilasHemmingway Indeed. I was wondering why that rimshot was even in the video- mistake or did I really miss something? When I read @Gadgetonomy's comment and the initial replies I decided to rewatch the segment, then finally looked it up when I still couldn't figure it out.
Yeah, there's just something really impressive about a piece of technology older than I am that still functions properly amongst a world filled with throwaway crap designed to break in a year and be replaced.
I'm 22 and I DO remember them being this good. We had(still have) an HMV 102 at my grandparents' house. As a kid I used to spend my time listening to old records as we had no electricity there back then.
I bought what I think is a 102 from a brocante in France. Its great condition (though not quite as mint as this one,) and came with an original tin of gold needles and a load of I guess steel ones, 5 cases of slate records all catalogued so it was clearly somebody's pride and joy from days of old. I absolutely adore putting on a 78, closing my eyes and being transported back in time. I feel quite privelidged to now be the guardian of such a piece of history. Yet another fantastic vid!
Well, my background is in digital electronics and I personally find both very interesting. You have to look at the mathematics behind all the digital media like CD, DVD, etc. Very stunning indeed 👍
That was fascinating -- I had no idea the different sound-boxes existed, that give you different frequency responses. I just figured they were all AM-radio-like, topping out at 3,000 Hz like an AM radio signal does. But no -- yours is 10 KHz?! Very surprising! What's even more surprising -- you can still get new needles for these things, apparently? Look at all those needles you have! Wow!
Yes the needles are still being made. There’s something very pleasing about a colourful new tin of needles. The three tins from OC/DC are newly made - links in the video description. Although some of the demos were recorded with NOS vintage medium needles.
@@Techmoan I remember William Gibson mentioning that, in California during the war, they use to use spines from a specific cactus since they couldn't get needles due to the metals shortage.
My dad still has this exact model! Next time I see him I'll have to find out when and where it was made. He always brings it out around Christmas time, so this year I got him a collection of gospel blues 78s ordered from Etsy. All pressed in 1948 I believe. They've clearly been very well looked after - no dust or scratches and hardly any surface noise at all. Much clearer sounding than any others in his collection. As for the gramophone itself, the sheer power on the thing is astonishing!! It fills up a whole house with ease, so easy to forget there's no electric amplification going on at all. We always find ourselves without any tea towels at Christmas because my dad has had to stuff them all into the trough!!
I was stunned by how loud the replay can be when I heard one ! - and 10KHz too - remarkable. Oh yes, the Muppets meet Not the Nine O'clock News sketch was nicely underplayed.
How interesting! My mother have told me that they had gramophones like these when she went to dances in the forties. She told that sometimes they couldn't hear the music properly for the sound of the feet of the dancing couples. I had no idea that I could get needles on eBay. We only had a few left so I haven't really wanted to use them. I better order a tin.
Hehe you can buy almost _anything_ on ebay; i once heard about a norwegian comedian who put his soul up for sale on auction there, and he actually got quite a high number of bidders before ebay stepped in and closed the auction because you have to have a "substantial" item to be allowed to sell, according to their terms. They are such spoilsports! ;)
People still manufacture steel needles, and even bamboo needles. Steel needles are very cheap, but bamboo needles sound a little better, albeit quieter. Look around for places other than eBay. You can pay a lot less than you would for new old stock needles.
@@joonglegamer9898 I don't know if it's the same guy you're referring to, but i also heard about an Australian guy who actually sold his entire life: Home, family, car, job, and even his circle of friends.
It'd be interesting to see if it'd be possible to use some kind of adapter to enable the use of a modern stylus with the soundbox, and maybe a spring or something to decrease/lessen the amount of tracking force the arm applies, all to allow this unit to use modern records without fear of damaging them (too much).
Back in the day... you *could* buy a counter-weight for your EMG, Victor, or HMV. They _kind of_ worked... but, it's hard to notice a difference. When you're talking about a "modern stylus," I assume you mean something with a diamond tip. Nope. It would eat up a shellac disc in one play. It's fine when you're using a modern light-weight tone arm with a modern cart, but trying to use one with an antique sound box? Nope.
When I was a kid, we found a working Victrola in a church storeroom, and naturally we needed to find a record to play. We found one, a 33 rpm LP. We put it on the turntable, turned the crank, set the needle down -- and heard the most awful of noises. It was the last time anyone played that record, too.
The arm on an acoustic player needs to apply a lot of force to extract enough energy from the rotating record to make the sound loud enough as there isn't any electronic amplification. Another thing is that modern records usually are lower RPM (33 1/3) and have smaller grooves. This is great for maximizing that amount of music you can pack onto the record, but for an acoustic player without electronic amplification, means less sound as smaller grooves and lower RPM=less energy=less sound and it probably wouldn't be enough sound for a gramophone.
I used to own a huge 78 rpm classical music collection from the 30's - 40's that was almost unplayed. Some of the albums had even the price tags and discs looked like a mirror, not even a scratch on them. I was surpriesed how bright, beautiful and clear was the sound, when played on a 1910's HMV with a huge brass horn , no cracks, no chips, just the zzzz sound when the needle passes through the groove. Something that you cannot replicate with digital recordings.
I saw a middle-aged street musician using one of those a couple of years ago. I had to stop and ask what he was playing. It took me 10 minutes to get away from him - he was so enthusiastic about it!
Thank you so much for showing this. There is so much misinformation and lack of knowledge out there and you demonstrated the machine beautifully. It is a mechanical work of art. HMV machines were always high quality. I used to have a cheap generic portable and a large console model from the 1920's (sadly, both sold decades ago) I still have the needles though. I played my 78's with a modern magnetic cartridge. Also nice to see those two jokers making an appearance too :-) Cheers
A couple interesting things about this machine (I have 3 of them). The inside is really fun to look at, and to get a full appreciation for how carefully crafted it is. If you unscrew the wooden motorboard and lift it out, it's fascinating to see just how big the horn is, how it's PACKED in there and you realize that what you have in this black box, in essence, is really JUST a horn, with a tiny motor shoehorned into the middle. Also, stick an SM58 into the opening, and witness the amazing frequency capabilities. Bass for days!
@SublimeHawk6 no, 144 is a more recent addition than 240. 240 used to be the lowest till they realised there's potato internet that can't even handle that.
@@AnonymousUser77254 144p had been the default option in the early years of UA-cam; “HQ” (ie 240p) picture quality was only offered for select video uploads.
Hi TM. We had this model as a child, over 60 years ago now. There were ‘harder’ needles with a red band where they fitted into the sound head and also ‘thorn’ needles which were gentle on the record but definitely one play only. I regret to say I dismantled it - the wind up clockwork motor was something to behold, absolutely massive. Brings back memories. Stay safe. BobUK
You did it and made me buy a worn out Model 101. Repaired it, rebuilt the soundbox as best as I could. A little rough on the high frequencies, but works like a charm otherwise. Had so much fun with the whole project and its outcome. Thank you for introducing me to this kind of device :)
Shaun Stephens a trademark now owned by Disney... he calls them his muppets him self (in the Patreon odd casts and in some of the descriptions on patreon) maybe he got them in a Disney store where you can make your custom muppets.
I learn something new every time I watch one of your videos! Thank you for keeping aging audiophiles like myself something to learn every now and again! Cheers from across the pond, near Washington, DC (please don't hold that against me) ;-)
It is not the aging of the material, but the way generations of collectors had handled them. I am a collector myself and I have more than 2000 of these shellac records.
I’m trying to find the vinyl or even the same song he plays here but it appears to be all piano versions. If you see the version on UA-cam or anywhere or the vinyl for sale he plays let me know thankyou!
@@brandonreynolds7380 you can kinda zoom in on the record before he spins it. the center label says: Serenade, Schubert, Salon Orchestra, 78RPM, Cat. S2765. also 8-522
I inherited my grandfathers 78s yesterday sadly we lost him a year ago but thankfully he taught us about country western music like Merle Travis and bob wills. I have been playing them on a General Electric mustang 200 record player but I’m planning on buying an acoustic gramophone in the near future. Unfortunately there is not as much information on the hobby online as I thought there would be. But this episode of Techmoan Is a great resource! I have collected 33 rpm for years but there is something new and fascinating about this older mechanical technology...
Love your channel, Technomoan. Thanks for the informative video. When I was just a small lad about 50 years ago in the early 70s, my parents answered a classified ad and bought a Columbia Grafonola, a big standing acoustic phonograph with lots of records in storage drawers. It was about 65 years old then. A few years later, we drove by White Horse Antiques in Albany, New York, USA on the way to church. There in the window was a Edison Home Phonograph, a cylinder phonograph that used a small brass horn for amplification. I dreamed about that thing for weeks, even doodling bad renderings of it in my notebooks at school, and I'm sure I made a complete nuisance of myself about it at home, as well. One Saturday my Dad and I went there. I made a beeline for it. He was doing a bit of haggling with the owner until I walked up (oblivious) and with stars in my eyes said, "Gosh, Dad, it's the greatest thing I've ever seen." Needless to say, he paid the listed price. I, too, like vintage antiques that do something, and I learned a valuable lesson about haggling on the drive home! My grade school age mates were listening to Three Dog Night at the time; I was hooked on the greatest hits of 1900-1945. I became known for my retro weirdness, but I didn't care. Now I collect Magnavox tube stereo gear, so for my audio at least, I'm still about 60 years behind the times! Stay safe, everyone!
Yes, i hear ya, most of the audio in my place is amplified via vacuum tubes.. A Scott amp, for discs, tape and cd'. Radio via a, '37 GE console radio, or a European "lucor" table radio.. I'm also a clock "nut"... It's not a real clock, unless it ticks, you have to wind it...
Yes, i hear ya, most of the audio in my place is amplified via vacuum tubes.. A Scott amp, for discs, tape and cd'. Radio via a, '37 GE console radio, or a European "lucor" table radio.. I'm also a clock "nut"... It's not a real clock, unless it ticks, you have to wind it...happily " behind the times"
I dug out some old Talking machine records and realized they could be early 1909 on up. Now I am learning about the gramophone player so I can play them.
Ok what happened? I just stumbled onto your channel yesterday, and now I've watched over a dozen hours of your videos. Love your content! Premium sub added
Two things really impressed me in this, one how clean the sound was compared to what I was lead to believe on movies and second how the needle literally scraps material from the disk as it plays! That shows that those disks wouldn't last long and why they could end sounding very bad after some time. EDIT: Ah ok it is not scraping material from the disks but is the needle itself being damaged that explains the amount of spares.
I recently purchased a gramophone from someone looking to thin their collection. Best purchase ever. Nothing electric can reproduce the same ambience and feel these gramophones make.
My parents gave our "suitbox" gramophone to the dustcart in late 1950's I think. I still remember as a kid accidentally dropping the lid on Dad's record of Orpheus in the Underworld. Then we had a mono Johnelle (from John Lewis Partnership) Later upgraded to a stereo Johnelle with the stereo speaker in the lid that slid off the hinge to be placed feet apart. I still have the first stereo record they bought of the Royal Horse Guards so that must be circa 1961. Noone wants them. I also have a full set of G&S D'Oyle Carte operettas, Just cannot find anyone who would appreciate them.
Could you imagine listening to a record for the first time ever and hearing some small bit of music or someone talking. It'd be like magic! People grabbing pitchforks and calling it work of the devil and all that. Simpler times.
Just recently I transcribed some Berliner discs for a friend to a digital format. Most date back to about 1903, but one was 1897. They're only just listenable to, but my goodness, how they must have fascinated people back then. I also part-restored a 1902 Columbia Graphophone that went with them. Note the name 'Graphophone'; at the time, 'Gramophone' was an RCA/HMV trademark.
Being a penniless teenager, I made my own turntable, buying the components on Exchange and Mart and making the case from scrap wood. Our radio had jack sockets in the back allowing it to be used as an amplifier. This was in 1957 which I know from the release date of my first record. The turntable was 3 speed - 33, 45 and 78. Our local record shop had all the new hits on both 45 and 78, and I chose the vinyl 45s because they were more compatible with the sapphire stylus and less prone to break. Most of my friends bought 78s and thought I was weird getting those newfangled little discs. I couldn't afford a Dansette on my 5 bob a week pocket money, and my turntable cost me a fraction of its price.
1921/5000 I had a friend, who was actually my father's friend, and I supplied my mother's antique shop with handicrafts that he made from sheet brass. But he was also a specialist for all kinds of mechanical music devices, from music boxes, orchestrions, street organs or organ boxes, also gramophones (even with mechanical amplifiers based on the spill principle) as well as Edison phonographs or wire magnetton devices. Stop everything that somehow made sounds or had to be brought back to it. His name was Arnold Hübsch, and every time you visited him you left his small workshop almost deaf, he had once again demonstrated one of the music monsters that could fill a whole fair in his maybe 50m² workshop. During one of the later visits, he also showed me his latest treasure: a sea chest filled with pre-recorded Edison rollers with acoustic direct-cut recordings that are over 100 years old but never played. He also owned a large number of original phonographs, but also a self-made one, with a precise electric drive and a modified electrical scanning system, connected to a high-quality stereo system. When he then inserted one of these (except for this one) originally sealed wax roller recordings into his electro-phonograph, I could hardly believe how crystal clear and lifelike these recordings were. One could have assumed that the musicians were actually in the room. Even the soft creaking of the wooden chairs on which the musicians were sitting in front of their recording funnels could be clearly identified. If you wanted to sell such a recording 100 times back then, singers and musicians had to record this piece of music 100 times. So it was actually a real life concert, just with a 100 year delay over this incredible time machine.
Very interesting video, and some good insight to how they work. My aunt has a large floor standing gramophone, it's always closed and she uses it as a kind of sideboard for photos etc. Unfortunately it's broken but I might try those websites you link above to see what's involved in getting it working again.
When I was a child, I had one gramophone too... To prevent wear on the gramophone records, I replaced the metal needles with orange tree thorns ... The result was a great success!!!
Talking of loud 78s, the first recording of the famous Widor Organ Toccata in F (a 1931 recording) was recorded loud enough to create slight overload distortion on the ff passages even with extra-soft tone needles.
Something that can also greatly help the sound on old gramophones - especially if they have the earlier style reproducers - is to replace the gasket material keeping the diaphragm in place. They're made of rubber, which becomes hard and brittle with age, which greatly reduces the ability of the diaphragm to fully move. New materials can be found on specialized websites.
Toy record players, in the early 60's when I was a young child, had electric turntables and acoustic sound boxes. Flash forward thirty years or so to sometime in the 1990s. By this time, I had an adult son in the US Navy, trained in electronics. I am not bragging, but the kid is bright. While on leave, he decided to convert my moms old vinyl records into computer files. He set up a computer to do this with a sound card and a turntable. He said "dad, did you know that if you listen very closely, you can hear the music? How quickly we forget about older technology.
Didn't think they could sound that good, my jaw dropped when the second record came on. I've always hated the sound of gramaphones, I was scared as a kid by the awful out of pitch, screeching, warbling, noise coming from one 😂 still sends a shudder.
Earlier records without runout grooves, and cheap machines without autostop (or some sort of bracket to stop the tone arm, at least) would happily carry on and shred the label!
@@michaelmartin9022 The first automatic stops were installed on the coin operated cylinder phonographs of the 1890s; they generally didn't start appearing on gramophones until the 1910s. They weren't entirely "automatic", though: they had to be set to the length of the particular record being played. The development of the eccentric groove soon obviated that necessity.
Mechanically amplified gramophones had to be heavy tracking because literally all the sound energy coming out of the machine* - probably several tens of watts - had to be transmitted from the clockwork motor to the soundbox and horn *through the needle,* which meant the sloped walls of the grooves on the record had to exert a huge sideways force against the needle to transmit this energy, and so the needle had to also be really heavy so that it wouldn't jump right out of the groove. This inevitably meant a huge rate of wear on these rubbing surfaces, so it made sense to have a cheap, replaceable needle wear down rather than some beloved recording, hence why the records were made as hard as possible (slate powder bound together with shellac was apparently typical) and the needles were deliberately made soft and disposable so as to preserve the record. The needles really were literally intended to be thrown away and replaced every single time you played a disc, and some instruction manuals from the time actually recommend putting in a new needle *every time you change sides!* Once electronic amplification came along, power could be supplied directly to the amplifier and the stylus only needed to provide the signal to be amplified, so tracking forces could be made vastly lighter and softer materials like vinyl became an option. *except in the case of rare, exotic and fiendishly clever devices like pneumatic and capstan amplifiers.
4:58 - So what you're telling me is, the music industry has ALWAYS been decades behind the times. 13:19 - And now I know where *ACϟDC* got their logo from.
I recently bought a Decca Brunswick wind up gramophone, the label under the deck dates it as a 1956 model (I did not know that they were still made by then). At a local flea market I have found 78s by Gene Vincent and Eddie Cochran, they sound fantastic.
I was at a house (in the UK) back in the 90's and the owner (a guy straight out of the Edwardian period, tweed and handlebar mustache) pulled out a wind-up and played a few discs. And here's the thing - human voice was reproduced in as life-like a way as I've ever heard! Unsurprisingly the discs included an Edith Piaf, and listening to her I felt like the dog in the HMV logo hearing, er, his master's voice coming from the horn. It really was almost spooky. My theory is that the diaphragm the needle is attached to is similar in size to, and emulates the human larynx. I've no doubt that measured distortion would have been been some ludicrously high figure but it's a reminder that such numbers often show little correlation to how < insert descriptive such as 'musical' here > audio reproduction systems actually sound.
Nipper belongs to His Master's Voice (HMV), the company founded by Emile Berliner, inventor of the disk record player. It was licensed to Victor, creator of the Victrola, later RCA-Victor.
I was NOT prepared for how good that second 75 sounded. Hifi mythbusting!
I almost spit out my coffee!
Indeed! That took _ME_ quite by surprise as well. Very interesting thing, that. :)
I agree. Im very surprised how good it sounds.
@@tubester4567 Took me by surprise too!
Same.
*78
"In order to play electrically recorded disks, you need an electric player"
"Do you have any?"
"No, they're not invented yet"
Yeah they had electric players from the late 1920s, but many country towns didn't have electricity, some until the 1960s
gramophoneshane
Actually, Edison’s first model of his ’improved cylinder Phonograph’ was driven by an electric motor.
@@HMV101 True enough, but they REALLY mean ELECTRONIC amplification during the RECORDING (and SOMETIMES playback) of the records, not the motive part.
gramophoneshane well there was the electrolas from as early as 1908. But yeah they weren’t fully electric until around 1927
Yeah, I think Brunswick and Victor were amongst the first to offer electrical driven turntables with electric amplification. Edison's first was the C-1 etc range of phono-radio combos.
A portable made in Germany by Dual has a motor that was both spring driven and electrically driven, and 2 reproduces were supplied for accoustic or electrical playback. I've got a HMV 122 from 1939 that has a spring motor and electric pick up designed for use with battery radios, and a Paillard with electric motor and accoustic reproduction, so there was a variety of choices once electrical recording and reproduction came into being.
ah techmoan. may be weird. but you have legit helped me mentally with your content. you give me a distraction from a depression i have that i can barley control. and your videos along with 8bit guys have helped me find a hobby. i now collect and fix all sorts of tech. and im a complete audiophile thanks to you. used to he fine with dollar store headphones. now im rocking 50$ Hesh 3s cause i cant stand bad audio now.
so thank you. so much. im so glad your channel exists. and im so glad to be here apart of it.
I’m happy to hear that. Depression is a git - glad I could help you kick it’s arse.
So I looked up what an "audiophile" is, and it means "a hi-fi enthusiast".
You coulda just said that, because I thought you meant like you had an ASMR fetish.
@@NunofYerbizness Ya know.
I can see that. But. Now you know. Personally. ASMR is weird and makes me uncomfortable
@@SnabbKassa oh wow. Guess some good can come out of bad things in this world.
@@NunofYerbizness hahaha, god
I had a very similar gramaphone back in the 70s when I was a teenager. I had to search out 78s as that was the only speed it played. As a result I ended learning about Gershwin and Berlin, Big Band, Classical and Jazz that my friends had never heard of. Quite the musical education and all because I was fascinated by an old gramaphone!
These old phonographs are so cool when you hear one in person it's like going back in time!!!
I have a stand-up unit with a similar hand crank, and it can fill the house with music! It even has volume adjustment via doors that cover the internal horn.
Sounds fantastic. Or I imagine it does. :)
@@kitgar61 It probably still has the older pickup unit. I'm thinking that a new wide-frequency pickup head could make for a good fathers day gift.
Which model?
I love my VV-100
I have a Victor Victrola IX 1913
Is it a Victrola? I have one that sounds like yours.
"Modern-day record players." What's astounding is that term still is a valid reference for equipment playing the 70-yr-old LP.
Modern record players haven't really changed since the late 1980s/early 90s. What they are making today is basically copies of what was available then, with the addition of digitization for user convenience. And the digitization in most of the cheap, Chinese players isn't that good, and the software they come with is often outdated. Most laptop computers can do the job better.
@Deon Denis It doesn't. The CD contains drivers for the digitizer/IO interface and sound editing software, commonly an old version of Audacity.
@SevelRomanov They need the preamp to drive the digital converter anyway, it works much better with a line level input than what the cartridge itself provides.
78's aren't LP's!!!
@@theantiquescollector2199 LPs are 70 years old. (78s are about a hundred years old!)
I remember the HMV 102 from my nursery school in 1960 when I was 4 years old. I was fascinated with the ritual of winding and needle changing. The teacher would play us 'Nellie the Elephant' which was the class favourite.
Amazing, thank you for sharing!
Bloody hell did you go to the same school 😂 as me lol
My grandmother bought one of these for my mum some time around 1940, which she used to play "Nellie the Elephant" on to my sister in the early 60s. It is still around somewhere. I will have to look for it. When I was a kid I used to be fascinated by how it worked without electricity. This would have been in the early 50s, and by then my dad who was a bit of a gadget freak already had an electric HMV. I used to love opening the little draw and sorting all the needles!
I actually started out becoming an audiophile, but as I sought more authentic historical recordings I became interested in acoustical technology. It has become a passion of mine for nearly 40 years now! (78’s and wax cylinders!)
audiophile is mad old people that are having Hz issues, LOL
This summer I was listening to a 101 that has been stored in my uncle house for ages. It was still working perfectly and I was surprised on how well it sounded. Amazing things!
You talking about "when I'm gone"
Thats just not gonna do man, we need ya here, I don't wanna hear it ❤
If he avoids the jab, he should be here for a long time more!
@@G-ra-ha-m - What makes you think that?
@@G-ra-ha-m 🤡💩
@@NOWtheband A number of very respected health professionals. In fact all of the ones not receiving money from the Bill and Melinda Foundation. Have a look at Health Impact News.
@@G-ra-ha-m - I see.
Techmoan: plays an 80 year old copyrighted recording...
Legal looking ghost appears: "ahem.. excuse me sir.."
Slimer was a lawyer??? 😉
That's how copyright works? Usually expires 50~100 years after the copyright owners death, however it depends what part of the world the claim is in...
@@Fifury161 Indeed, sadly and mainly thanks to disney that's now the case. It use to be immediately after said death.... then after a few years and now up to 70yrs after death
@@DeanDoom It depends on the jurisdiction...
@@Fifury161 The US will likely increase it, soon. Disney has a lot of lobbying power and a death-grip on that mouse.
Mind you, right now they're maintaining all those huge theme parks with precisely 0 customers coming through the doors, that can't be cheap.
Every time I watch Techmoan I discover things I never knew I wanted. If there's a 78 revival in the next few months we know where it started.
There's been stranger events this year.
Honestly 78s are pretty dope in my opinion. Course they have big issues such as the records actually being able to shatter, and degradation but heck they seem fun to mess around with.
There absolutely should be. Many of the players are now a century or older. Amazing to have an interactive antique.
I obtained an HMV wind-up portable many years ago, and recall being amazed at the volume it delivered - ('put a sock in it' as you say), and in fact some of the 1950s 78 rpm discs contained enough energy within the grooves to bounce off the pick-up when played on a modern record deck. Many thanks for an informative and enjoyable video.
That takes me back. Being born in 74, I was allowed to play unfettered with one of these. The sight of all the plated fittings took me right back! Jimmy Shand was all I had to play using rose thorns from the garden as a needle! Thanks for a great Trip down Memory lane 👍😀
"Is this a wind up?" haha I loved that gag!
Yeah that might be the hardest I've laughed in weeks.
Yeah, but I thought the rimshot was gratuitous.
For non-Brits like me: "WIND-UP ...12. (slang Brit) an act or instance of teasing: she just thinks it's a big wind-up." (The Free Dictionary)
@@QunMang Yes, for the confused non-Brits like us, this comment was quite the wind-up!
@@SilasHemmingway Indeed. I was wondering why that rimshot was even in the video- mistake or did I really miss something? When I read @Gadgetonomy's comment and the initial replies I decided to rewatch the segment, then finally looked it up when I still couldn't figure it out.
I was amazed by the sound quality.
Also, love that Not the Nine O'Clock news inspired bit.
I like old things that still do things. My favorite quote.
Yeah, there's just something really impressive about a piece of technology older than I am that still functions properly amongst a world filled with throwaway crap designed to break in a year and be replaced.
I agree, when digital is not available. Even some movie implies the thing, but not so fast.
I am born in the cassette era, and haven't yet owned a record player, still a good learning. Techmoan thanks for your contributions.
I'm 22 and I DO remember them being this good. We had(still have) an HMV 102 at my grandparents' house. As a kid I used to spend my time listening to old records as we had no electricity there back then.
Back in the 1960s our elderly teacher had us learning country dancing by playing records on her original wind-up gramophone player. Great fun!
I bought what I think is a 102 from a brocante in France. Its great condition (though not quite as mint as this one,) and came with an original tin of gold needles and a load of I guess steel ones, 5 cases of slate records all catalogued so it was clearly somebody's pride and joy from days of old. I absolutely adore putting on a 78, closing my eyes and being transported back in time. I feel quite privelidged to now be the guardian of such a piece of history. Yet another fantastic vid!
i find this analog technology way more stunning and interesting than all that digital stuff today
haha zwangsläufig. Haben se am Altschauerberg wieder mal den Strom gekappt. 😏
Meddl Loide!
Ja klar, so macht man das doch immer :D @funkjoker
Really depends on the viewpoint
Well, my background is in digital electronics and I personally find both very interesting. You have to look at the mathematics behind all the digital media like CD, DVD, etc. Very stunning indeed 👍
I like working antiques too man ive been having fun with this 1950's camera that is to this day my most reliable camera
That was fascinating -- I had no idea the different sound-boxes existed, that give you different frequency responses. I just figured they were all AM-radio-like, topping out at 3,000 Hz like an AM radio signal does. But no -- yours is 10 KHz?! Very surprising!
What's even more surprising -- you can still get new needles for these things, apparently? Look at all those needles you have! Wow!
Yes the needles are still being made. There’s something very pleasing about a colourful new tin of needles. The three tins from OC/DC are newly made - links in the video description. Although some of the demos were recorded with NOS vintage medium needles.
@@Techmoan I remember William Gibson mentioning that, in California during the war, they use to use spines from a specific cactus since they couldn't get needles due to the metals shortage.
There were also sold as an upgrade for example the Meltrope range is quite well known
hoilst the cactus or bamboo needles are called „fiber” and they are said to cause less wear to records
Most experts recommend avoiding the fibre needles as they can shed bits in the groove that are very difficult to extract.
My dad still has this exact model! Next time I see him I'll have to find out when and where it was made. He always brings it out around Christmas time, so this year I got him a collection of gospel blues 78s ordered from Etsy. All pressed in 1948 I believe. They've clearly been very well looked after - no dust or scratches and hardly any surface noise at all. Much clearer sounding than any others in his collection. As for the gramophone itself, the sheer power on the thing is astonishing!! It fills up a whole house with ease, so easy to forget there's no electric amplification going on at all. We always find ourselves without any tea towels at Christmas because my dad has had to stuff them all into the trough!!
I was stunned by how loud the replay can be when I heard one ! - and 10KHz too - remarkable.
Oh yes, the Muppets meet Not the Nine O'clock News sketch was nicely underplayed.
Techmoan: today we will watch paint dry
Me: this is going to be a good one!!!
Big discussion on types of paint preparation temperature substrate lead content and so on
High Path ....Me: munching popcorn
Sixty Symbols did it.
1:57 and 2:05 are nice shots. Could sell those as stock footage.
If he did, he’d probably get content matched on this, his own, original video using the footage 😒
It's a beautiful gramophone, but it's in need of a re-cap.
How interesting! My mother have told me that they had gramophones like these when she went to dances in the forties. She told that sometimes they couldn't hear the music properly for the sound of the feet of the dancing couples.
I had no idea that I could get needles on eBay. We only had a few left so I haven't really wanted to use them. I better order a tin.
Hehe you can buy almost _anything_ on ebay; i once heard about a norwegian comedian who put his soul up for sale on auction there, and he actually got quite a high number of bidders before ebay stepped in and closed the auction because you have to have a "substantial" item to be allowed to sell, according to their terms. They are such spoilsports! ;)
People still manufacture steel needles, and even bamboo needles. Steel needles are very cheap, but bamboo needles sound a little better, albeit quieter. Look around for places other than eBay. You can pay a lot less than you would for new old stock needles.
@@BertGrink Yep, you could even buy a whole family. I thought it was hilarious.
@@joonglegamer9898 I don't know if it's the same guy you're referring to, but i also heard about an Australian guy who actually sold his entire life: Home, family, car, job, and even his circle of friends.
@@BertGrink Yeah, that's another Example I heard of as well.
It'd be interesting to see if it'd be possible to use some kind of adapter to enable the use of a modern stylus with the soundbox, and maybe a spring or something to decrease/lessen the amount of tracking force the arm applies, all to allow this unit to use modern records without fear of damaging them (too much).
Back in the day... you *could* buy a counter-weight for your EMG, Victor, or HMV. They _kind of_ worked... but, it's hard to notice a difference.
When you're talking about a "modern stylus," I assume you mean something with a diamond tip. Nope. It would eat up a shellac disc in one play. It's fine when you're using a modern light-weight tone arm with a modern cart, but trying to use one with an antique sound box? Nope.
When I was a kid, we found a working Victrola in a church storeroom, and naturally we needed to find a record to play. We found one, a 33 rpm LP. We put it on the turntable, turned the crank, set the needle down -- and heard the most awful of noises. It was the last time anyone played that record, too.
The arm on an acoustic player needs to apply a lot of force to extract enough energy from the rotating record to make the sound loud enough as there isn't any electronic amplification. Another thing is that modern records usually are lower RPM (33 1/3) and have smaller grooves. This is great for maximizing that amount of music you can pack onto the record, but for an acoustic player without electronic amplification, means less sound as smaller grooves and lower RPM=less energy=less sound and it probably wouldn't be enough sound for a gramophone.
I used to own a huge 78 rpm classical music collection from the 30's - 40's that was almost unplayed. Some of the albums had even the price tags and discs looked like a mirror, not even a scratch on them. I was surpriesed how bright, beautiful and clear was the sound, when played on a 1910's HMV with a huge brass horn , no cracks, no chips, just the zzzz sound when the needle passes through the groove. Something that you cannot replicate with digital recordings.
At 7:05 in the foreground a musician is holding a Stroh violin, specifically engineered for acoustic recordings.
I saw a middle-aged street musician using one of those a couple of years ago. I had to stop and ask what he was playing. It took me 10 minutes to get away from him - he was so enthusiastic about it!
I like the Stroh fiddle as an instrument in its own right.
Still better than a Crosley.
So is an Arby's wet fart.
@@IntegerOfDoom hahahahahahahahahahaha
No it isn’t.
This joke is getting really old.
It’s all the crybaby Americans that say it since Crosley sold their brand to the Chinese, and we know how much they hate them!
Now you made me want to watch the "Not the nine o'clock news" grammophone sketch.
fritspas - Same here!
3 watts... no, two thousand!
danehb89 - Classic!
Thank you so much for showing this. There is so much misinformation and lack of knowledge out there and you demonstrated the machine beautifully. It is a mechanical work of art. HMV machines were always high quality. I used to have a cheap generic portable and a large console model from the 1920's (sadly, both sold decades ago) I still have the needles though. I played my 78's with a modern magnetic cartridge. Also nice to see those two jokers making an appearance too :-) Cheers
This history lesson must go on record as thoroughly entertaining! 💿
I see what you did here.
With GOOD Needles You can get great sound...i love my Stand up Victrola.. and Its 5am and Im Still Awake.
Same, buddy, same.
12:23 when you weighed the tracking force I legitimately shouted out loud "oh my GOD!"
Cool 😎 man
10,000 hz of sound from a gramaphone? That's amazing.
i like the crackle and pops really,feels oldgashioned and has it's own special sound that you can't replicate with modern devices
A couple interesting things about this machine (I have 3 of them). The inside is really fun to look at, and to get a full appreciation for how carefully crafted it is. If you unscrew the wooden motorboard and lift it out, it's fascinating to see just how big the horn is, how it's PACKED in there and you realize that what you have in this black box, in essence, is really JUST a horn, with a tiny motor shoehorned into the middle. Also, stick an SM58 into the opening, and witness the amazing frequency capabilities. Bass for days!
I love watching the lines flow through the needle.
In this modern era you can simulate "old timey" UA-cam videos by watching in 240p
Or just dont. UA-cam wasn't a thing back then ;)
@SublimeHawk6 no, 144 is a more recent addition than 240. 240 used to be the lowest till they realised there's potato internet that can't even handle that.
@@AnonymousUser77254 144p had been the default option in the early years of UA-cam; “HQ” (ie 240p) picture quality was only offered for select video uploads.
@@Aleksa_Milicevic then it was removed at some point. I can explicitly remember its introduction.
Fun fact, 144 lines is less than the resolution of both PAL and NTSC VHS and VCD. Yes, you can watch a UA-cam video at a lower-than-VCD resolution.
Hi TM. We had this model as a child, over 60 years ago now. There were ‘harder’ needles with a red band where they fitted into the sound head and also ‘thorn’ needles which were gentle on the record but definitely one play only. I regret to say I dismantled it - the wind up clockwork motor was something to behold, absolutely massive. Brings back memories. Stay safe. BobUK
You did it and made me buy a worn out Model 101. Repaired it, rebuilt the soundbox as best as I could. A little rough on the high frequencies, but works like a charm otherwise. Had so much fun with the whole project and its outcome. Thank you for introducing me to this kind of device :)
Glad to se the puppets again. 😀
The muppets are back 🎉🎶
I'm so glad that they came back. I've missed them for a while.
PassiveDestroyer me too I love that dry british humor!
And better than ever :)
They're not "Muppets" - that's a trademark of Jim Henson. These are puppets.
Shaun Stephens a trademark now owned by Disney... he calls them his muppets him self (in the Patreon odd casts and in some of the descriptions on patreon) maybe he got them in a Disney store where you can make your custom muppets.
I learn something new every time I watch one of your videos! Thank you for keeping aging audiophiles like myself something to learn every now and again! Cheers from across the pond, near Washington, DC (please don't hold that against me) ;-)
It is not the aging of the material, but the way generations of collectors had handled them. I am a collector myself and I have more than 2000 of these shellac records.
This video made me buy my HMV 102 half a year ago. It’s now my favourite thing I own
3:16 reminds me of Spongebob blowing leaves.
😊 yep
1:35 Schubert-Liszt: S.560 No.7 - "Ständchen" (Serenade)
Thank you! I searched nearly an hour to find your comment
I’m trying to find the vinyl or even the same song he plays here but it appears to be all piano versions. If you see the version on UA-cam or anywhere or the vinyl for sale he plays let me know thankyou!
@@brandonreynolds7380 you can kinda zoom in on the record before he spins it. the center label says: Serenade, Schubert, Salon Orchestra, 78RPM, Cat. S2765. also 8-522
@@Mike1614b thank you I will try to find it
Thanks king
thanks for making these! It's a really great way to see how much better things really were back in the day.
"I like old things that still do things" you have put the rights words to what i feel. Thats why i'm here. Greetings from Argentina.
I inherited my grandfathers 78s yesterday sadly we lost him a year ago but thankfully he taught us about country western music like Merle Travis and bob wills. I have been playing them on a General Electric mustang 200 record player but I’m planning on buying an acoustic gramophone in the near future. Unfortunately there is not as much information on the hobby online as I thought there would be. But this episode of Techmoan Is a great resource! I have collected 33 rpm for years but there is something new and fascinating about this older mechanical technology...
You know our copyright system is screwed up when you have to worry about your shellac 78 triggering a copyright claim.
Love your channel, Technomoan. Thanks for the informative video.
When I was just a small lad about 50 years ago in the early 70s, my parents answered a classified ad and bought a Columbia Grafonola, a big standing acoustic phonograph with lots of records in storage drawers. It was about 65 years old then. A few years later, we drove by White Horse Antiques in Albany, New York, USA on the way to church. There in the window was a Edison Home Phonograph, a cylinder phonograph that used a small brass horn for amplification. I dreamed about that thing for weeks, even doodling bad renderings of it in my notebooks at school, and I'm sure I made a complete nuisance of myself about it at home, as well.
One Saturday my Dad and I went there. I made a beeline for it. He was doing a bit of haggling with the owner until I walked up (oblivious) and with stars in my eyes said, "Gosh, Dad, it's the greatest thing I've ever seen." Needless to say, he paid the listed price. I, too, like vintage antiques that do something, and I learned a valuable lesson about haggling on the drive home!
My grade school age mates were listening to Three Dog Night at the time; I was hooked on the greatest hits of 1900-1945. I became known for my retro weirdness, but I didn't care.
Now I collect Magnavox tube stereo gear, so for my audio at least, I'm still about 60 years behind the times!
Stay safe, everyone!
Yes, i hear ya, most of the audio in my place is amplified via vacuum tubes.. A Scott amp, for discs, tape and cd'. Radio via a, '37 GE console radio, or a European "lucor" table radio.. I'm also a clock "nut"... It's not a real clock, unless it ticks, you have to wind it...
Yes, i hear ya, most of the audio in my place is amplified via vacuum tubes.. A Scott amp, for discs, tape and cd'. Radio via a, '37 GE console radio, or a European "lucor" table radio.. I'm also a clock "nut"... It's not a real clock, unless it ticks, you have to wind it...happily " behind the times"
I dug out some old Talking machine records and realized they could be early 1909 on up. Now I am learning about the gramophone player so I can play them.
Gramophones are BEAUTIFUL Machines! Thanks for sharing this.
Ok what happened? I just stumbled onto your channel yesterday, and now I've watched over a dozen hours of your videos. Love your content! Premium sub added
Two things really impressed me in this, one how clean the sound was compared to what I was lead to believe on movies and second how the needle literally scraps material from the disk as it plays! That shows that those disks wouldn't last long and why they could end sounding very bad after some time. EDIT: Ah ok it is not scraping material from the disks but is the needle itself being damaged that explains the amount of spares.
I recently purchased a gramophone from someone looking to thin their collection. Best purchase ever. Nothing electric can reproduce the same ambience and feel these gramophones make.
I dont even want to think of you dying anytime soon, we all need videos from you for at least 50 years more!
My parents gave our "suitbox" gramophone to the dustcart in late 1950's I think. I still remember as a kid accidentally dropping the lid on Dad's record of Orpheus in the Underworld. Then we had a mono Johnelle (from John Lewis Partnership) Later upgraded to a stereo Johnelle with the stereo speaker in the lid that slid off the hinge to be placed feet apart. I still have the first stereo record they bought of the Royal Horse Guards so that must be circa 1961. Noone wants them. I also have a full set of G&S D'Oyle Carte operettas, Just cannot find anyone who would appreciate them.
Could you imagine listening to a record for the first time ever and hearing some small bit of music or someone talking. It'd be like magic! People grabbing pitchforks and calling it work of the devil and all that. Simpler times.
You must have missed the forum he showed named "The Talking Machine" forum. Phonographs were called "Talking Machines" for many decades.
Just recently I transcribed some Berliner discs for a friend to a digital format. Most date back to about 1903, but one was 1897. They're only just listenable to, but my goodness, how they must have fascinated people back then. I also part-restored a 1902 Columbia Graphophone that went with them. Note the name 'Graphophone'; at the time, 'Gramophone' was an RCA/HMV trademark.
That is one of the most pristine looking HMV gramophones I have ever seen. Amazing
Happy to be able to listen to a gramophone directly and to see how it actually works
Loved the puppet show. That wind up pun is criminal 🤣🤣🤣
5:54 Hey let that run... it's beautiful music
Very cool sound system! Really makes you wonder about how far recording and playback technology has gone in the ~100 years after this came out!
Being a penniless teenager, I made my own turntable, buying the components on Exchange and Mart and making the case from scrap wood. Our radio had jack sockets in the back allowing it to be used as an amplifier. This was in 1957 which I know from the release date of my first record. The turntable was 3 speed - 33, 45 and 78. Our local record shop had all the new hits on both 45 and 78, and I chose the vinyl 45s because they were more compatible with the sapphire stylus and less prone to break. Most of my friends bought 78s and thought I was weird getting those newfangled little discs. I couldn't afford a Dansette on my 5 bob a week pocket money, and my turntable cost me a fraction of its price.
1921/5000
I had a friend, who was actually my father's friend, and I supplied my mother's antique shop with handicrafts that he made from sheet brass. But he was also a specialist for all kinds of mechanical music devices, from music boxes, orchestrions, street organs or organ boxes, also gramophones (even with mechanical amplifiers based on the spill principle) as well as Edison phonographs or wire magnetton devices. Stop everything that somehow made sounds or had to be brought back to it. His name was Arnold Hübsch, and every time you visited him you left his small workshop almost deaf, he had once again demonstrated one of the music monsters that could fill a whole fair in his maybe 50m² workshop.
During one of the later visits, he also showed me his latest treasure: a sea chest filled with pre-recorded Edison rollers with acoustic direct-cut recordings that are over 100 years old but never played. He also owned a large number of original phonographs, but also a self-made one, with a precise electric drive and a modified electrical scanning system, connected to a high-quality stereo system.
When he then inserted one of these (except for this one) originally sealed wax roller recordings into his electro-phonograph, I could hardly believe how crystal clear and lifelike these recordings were. One could have assumed that the musicians were actually in the room. Even the soft creaking of the wooden chairs on which the musicians were sitting in front of their recording funnels could be clearly identified. If you wanted to sell such a recording 100 times back then, singers and musicians had to record this piece of music 100 times. So it was actually a real life concert, just with a 100 year delay over this incredible time machine.
13:13 I think I see where the inspiration for AC/DC's logo came from.
Thought the same thing ..
Thought I was the only one noticing that.
Ironically they got that name from seeing that on an old sewing machine of all things
😮 holy crap that’s mind blowing 🤯
Very interesting video, and some good insight to how they work. My aunt has a large floor standing gramophone, it's always closed and she uses it as a kind of sideboard for photos etc. Unfortunately it's broken but I might try those websites you link above to see what's involved in getting it working again.
When I was a child, I had one gramophone too... To prevent wear on the gramophone records, I replaced the metal needles with orange tree thorns ... The result was a great success!!!
Talking of loud 78s, the first recording of the famous Widor Organ Toccata in F (a 1931 recording) was recorded loud enough to create slight overload distortion on the ff passages even with extra-soft tone needles.
Listen. I was born in 1965 in Canada.I was exposed to 78, 45 and LP's. I remember listening to German 78's from 1910's and the 1920's.. It was heaven.
9:27 Rowan Atkinson's Grammophone sketch flashbacks!
I noticed that too. "I would like to buy a gramophone, please".
Smith and Jones?
Not The Nine O'clock News, I think.
The pops, crackles, harsh and thin sound is part of the charm with these gramophones 👍🏼
Something that can also greatly help the sound on old gramophones - especially if they have the earlier style reproducers - is to replace the gasket material keeping the diaphragm in place. They're made of rubber, which becomes hard and brittle with age, which greatly reduces the ability of the diaphragm to fully move. New materials can be found on specialized websites.
WARNING! There is a channel re-uploading some of Techmoan's videos! The channel is called "World Beats".
I didn't see any there, are you sure you're not just plugging a channel? :)
@@6581punk ua-cam.com/channels/DE9oGnrhTQdYvsmSaaHEJg.html
@@freund333 Aha. There's more than one channel with that name :)
They will be dealt with severely.
I can't imagine you being gone. You've been part of me. Because of you, I learned about the this incredible old techs and got some interest on them.
Toy record players, in the early 60's when I was a young child, had electric turntables and acoustic sound boxes.
Flash forward thirty years or so to sometime in the 1990s. By this time, I had an adult son in the US Navy, trained in electronics. I am not bragging, but the kid is bright. While on leave, he decided to convert my moms old vinyl records into computer files. He set up a computer to do this with a sound card and a turntable. He said "dad, did you know that if you listen very closely, you can hear the music? How quickly we forget about older technology.
Didn't think they could sound that good, my jaw dropped when the second record came on.
I've always hated the sound of gramaphones, I was scared as a kid by the awful out of pitch, screeching, warbling, noise coming from one 😂 still sends a shudder.
I wonder why the runout groove is so wobbly; to trigger some crude autostop mechanism, perhaps?
In a sense, yes. 78rpm jukeboxes could detect the back and forth movement of the arm and actuate the mechanism based on that.
Yes, it was called an excentric groove, and triggered the first fully automatic stops
Earlier records without runout grooves, and cheap machines without autostop (or some sort of bracket to stop the tone arm, at least) would happily carry on and shred the label!
@@michaelmartin9022 The first automatic stops were installed on the coin operated cylinder phonographs of the 1890s; they generally didn't start appearing on gramophones until the 1910s. They weren't entirely "automatic", though: they had to be set to the length of the particular record being played. The development of the eccentric groove soon obviated that necessity.
There are plenty of LPs with eccentric runouts as well, though perhaps none made within the past 50 years
"Crosleys ruin records! They have a tracking force of 5 grams!"
130g tracking force gramophone: 0_0
Mechanically amplified gramophones had to be heavy tracking because literally all the sound energy coming out of the machine* - probably several tens of watts - had to be transmitted from the clockwork motor to the soundbox and horn *through the needle,* which meant the sloped walls of the grooves on the record had to exert a huge sideways force against the needle to transmit this energy, and so the needle had to also be really heavy so that it wouldn't jump right out of the groove. This inevitably meant a huge rate of wear on these rubbing surfaces, so it made sense to have a cheap, replaceable needle wear down rather than some beloved recording, hence why the records were made as hard as possible (slate powder bound together with shellac was apparently typical) and the needles were deliberately made soft and disposable so as to preserve the record.
The needles really were literally intended to be thrown away and replaced every single time you played a disc, and some instruction manuals from the time actually recommend putting in a new needle *every time you change sides!*
Once electronic amplification came along, power could be supplied directly to the amplifier and the stylus only needed to provide the signal to be amplified, so tracking forces could be made vastly lighter and softer materials like vinyl became an option.
*except in the case of rare, exotic and fiendishly clever devices like pneumatic and capstan amplifiers.
Now that is a thing of beauty, the fit and finish are great.
I absolutely love this guys videos. Have so for a few years now. Going to be a sad day when they come to an end.
Great video as always, and quite enlightening. But most of all I'm so glad the puppets are back!!😁
4:58 - So what you're telling me is, the music industry has ALWAYS been decades behind the times.
13:19 - And now I know where *ACϟDC* got their logo from.
Love the “not the nine o’clock news” sketch reference
I recently bought a Decca Brunswick wind up gramophone, the label under the deck dates it as a 1956 model (I did not know that they were still made by then). At a local flea market I have found 78s by Gene Vincent and Eddie Cochran, they sound fantastic.
I was at a house (in the UK) back in the 90's and the owner (a guy straight out of the Edwardian period, tweed and handlebar mustache) pulled out a wind-up and played a few discs. And here's the thing - human voice was reproduced in as life-like a way as I've ever heard! Unsurprisingly the discs included an Edith Piaf, and listening to her I felt like the dog in the HMV logo hearing, er, his master's voice coming from the horn. It really was almost spooky. My theory is that the diaphragm the needle is attached to is similar in size to, and emulates the human larynx. I've no doubt that measured distortion would have been been some ludicrously high figure but it's a reminder that such numbers often show little correlation to how < insert descriptive such as 'musical' here > audio reproduction systems actually sound.
Block comments that say "Wanna be friends?" it's a hacker bot.
I love your content and I want your channel to remain safe.
Absolutely fascination, I'm a hi-tech guy but old analog tech and especially mechanical just makes me giddy as a kid every time
It will be very sad when you're gone. Your videos are really interesting and entertaining as well.
7:31 i just found out that this brand became RCA after some years, thanks to Nipper, the little dog on the bottom that also RCA used
Yep, RCA/Victor. Sometime around WWII, the Japanese branch of Victor went independent and became Japan Victor Company-- JVC.
Nipper belongs to His Master's Voice (HMV), the company founded by Emile Berliner, inventor of the disk record player. It was licensed to Victor, creator of the Victrola, later RCA-Victor.
I think RCA bought out Victor who owned nipper
I would loved to have heard all of "Heart and Soul".
1:30 - Most of us are listening to our wind up acoustic gramophones while the world burns to a pandemic.
the music even fits
Ya.