[dominicbeesley]

If they are rare records you really don't want to play them with a stylus that they were designed for as they are expensive to keep sharp and take some of the life out of the record each time you play it. An optical solution has many advantages not least of which is that it should not damage the record!

I was thinking along similar lines a while ago but I decided that a better idea would be to look at the optics and controller in an optical mouse. I've no idea if they would be fast enough, however if you are wanting this to transcribe recordings to CD then it might be a goer as you could run the disc at a slow rate...