Playing back 78RPM records.

[Valvepower]

Hello,

That ‘ole chestnut… Playing back 78RPM records.

I’ve just trawled the forum and found two cracking posts dating back to 2010 as regards playing 78’s... Crickey, that's 12 years ago!

https://www.vintage-radio.net/forum/...ad.php?t=49691

https://www.vintage-radio.net/forum/...ad.php?t=55009

Reading these posts makes me think I’m barking up the right tree using a Quad QCII preamplifier for 78 playback duties.

Anway, I’ve been asked to copy over a selection of a late husband’s 78 record collection, which pretty much spans the 1950’s, over to MP3 for playback on ‘modern’ equipment. I have no idea of the state of them and how worn they are. As far as I know most are of UK origin, but I’ll know more when I get to see them.

Of late I’ve not really thought much about 78 RPM records, except for the occasional one bought at a charity store and played on my Black Box or Bush record player… And there were the ones I came by as young Lad with radiograms and suchlike which, met with a sticky ‘frisbee’ like end against the garden wall… Ooh, the days of being given an old radiogram with a selection of 50’s 78’s… The 78 I remember was Hang Down Your Head Tom Dooley, but I digress…

I know it’s being nostalgic, but I want to perform the phono EQ in the analogue domain using a ‘period’ valve preamplifier so that means I’ll need a suitable period valve preamplifier for use with the Audio-Technica AT-VM95 78RPM cartridge fitted to a Goldring GL75. I’ve had a look in the toybox, and I have two Quad QCII preamplifiers. The plan is to place a workshop brewed buffer, with a gain/attenuator control and a high pass filter to remove LF noise (the QCII doesn't have one), between the output of the QCII preamplifier and the input of an external Sound Blaster SBX ADC. The tone controls and low pass filter on the QCII will be useful to tidy up the signal, given the limitations of the available EQ curves.

The QCII’s are later units, Serial # 14712 and 18110 putting them just above and below the 17000 ‘third version’ change point with the two versions of the EQ. Looking at the earlier posts this preamplifier has been discussed in the past on the forum and on Keith Snooks site plus on the Trader sheet. I’ll have to restore the QCII as the some of the carbon resistors, and most definitely the ‘Hunts Brown’ polyester and electrolytic capacitors will need replacing.

I’ll run the QCII preamplifier off the Roband HV bench power supply.

Audacity and the Sound Blaster SBX ADC will do the digital duties along with offering some useful ‘digital’ tools. I may fit a PPM to the output of the buffer on the input to the ADC as extra monitoring as not to rely on the bar-graph meter on Audacity, although I maybe overegging the omelette here. Using Audacity also came up in the earlier posts and it was felt by one person to be OK.

Further to the two posts back in 2010, do the folk who have used to Quad QCII preamplifier for 78 playback duties feel it’s as good as I’m going to get for a period piece of equipment – I suppose having two in the workshop is a good enough reason, but technically I feel the Quad QCII is up for the job.

Alright, the ‘ole OCII will not have the speed of a good phono amplifier using modern ‘OP amp’ design techniques, so it may mask or slow down the scratches etc., and thus hinder the ability of Audacity to effectively apply its digital tools.

Sop press, but I’ve unearthed a Leak Varislope Stereo preamplifier with two 78 EQ settings so if the Quad doesn't cut the mustard there is another contender waiting in the wings!

This time I’ll respect the 78’s and not use them for target practice in the garden…

Regards
Terry

[wd40addict]

Just to raise a probably controversial opinion. I once fully rebuilt a QCII with the intention of using it for 78s in tandem with my Radford STA15. Unfortunately it sounded worse than just using the RIAA stage in my then Audiolab!

Especially with 50s 78s you may be better digitising through an RIAA preamp then tweaking the results with the EQ in Audacity.

Purists will scoff, but I suggest you try it.

[Jan Zodiac]

I play a lot of 78 records myself. I currently use a Leak Varislope Mono, for both mono vinyl records, and 78's. I do plan a future preamplifier build, that gives more facilities when it comes to equalizing, especially the bass roll-off frequencies.
But I must say, that even through the RIAA on this Leak, it is very easy with the tone controls and filter + slope setting, to get a very decent playback of 78's from most of the 78's electrically recorded era. Another advantage with this preamp is, that the tone controls/filter also affects the tape out. Transferring old records, can then be adjusted for each individual record to optimum if wanted.
The turntable I use is a Philips changer with magnetic cartridges. I'm sure modern cartridges wired for mono can be used as well. I like this turntable because the speed can be adjusted.
Main amplifier is the TL25+ and speaker is a 15" University duplex in a large horn enclosure.

For older mechanically recorded records, as well as pretty worn records in general, I play them through an old 40's amplifier and a turntable with magnetic cartridge for steel needles. I find this more pleasing for very old records.

So my experience is also that playing especially the newer 78's through a RIAA and then adjusting tone controls, will give a great result.

Regards,

Jan

[RojDW48]

The Rogers Stereomaster pre-amp I got recently appears to have 'Standard' (78?) equalisation - though I haven't tried it yet.

[Valvepower]

Hello,

Thanks for all the replies, there're all quite relevant.

I hadn’t discounted using a Leak preamplifier as I have a Varislaope Stereo preamplifier. I’ll also look at the Rogers Preamplifier.

Wd40addict, far from being a controversial opinion, you’re offering a sensible suggestion using a ‘modern’ solid state preamplifier, which is also worth a try. I have Phono amplifier circuit where I can easily modify the EQ circuit for the coarse grove 78 EQ of 3180, 450 and 50uS.

I need to find a good replacement idler wheel for my GL75.

Regards
Terry

[Nickthedentist]

I used to get surprisingly good results with a GL75 / G800 (+ cheap, special 78 stylus) fed into a Leak Delta 70, with nothing more than a quick twiddle of the tone controls to sort the EQ.

[Bobdger]

I use a SL1200 mk5 deck with mods. The kit of parts and pcb came from a guy down Devon way to allow 78 with adjustment on deck from 60 - 85rpm
the best cartrige that I have found so far is the new version (last year) of the Ortofon 2M78.
Bob.

[bluepilot]

I built a Rod Elliot preamp with the intention of using it to digitize 78s but in the end I never used it. I found it better to transfer everything flat and do the equalization with Audacity afterwards. That way if you decide you got the wrong equalization curve you can just redo it and don't have to mess around unequalizing it first.

Older versions of audacity allowed you to just specify the turnover frequency and 10kHz cut and it would generate an equalization curve. That seems to have disappeared with later versions which is a nuisance but you can use an old version.

I use Brian Davis' ClickRepair and DeNoise to process the audio but Brian Davis seems to have gone offline so don't know where you'd get a copy with activation code.

[Jan Zodiac]

What I dislike about the newer cartridges, especially the Ortofon series, is the low tracking force of 1,5 to 1,8 gr. For 78 rpm at least 5 gr. is needed, unless only the latest and most perfect records are being played. Another thing is that the needle radius is 65um, which again, is also only for the latest 78 rpm records in production. 75um would be much more of an allround size, that allows older records to be played with less noise. But again, if the tracking force is below 2 gr. the tracking itself would be poor.

Except for the older cartridges is use, I had good results with getting a DJ needle (higher tracking force), retipped with a 75um tip.

Regards,

Jan

[bluepilot]

There has been a lot of discussion about which is the best sized stylus to use. The best choice depends on all sorts of things such as the width of the record groove or how it was played in the past (steel needle or stylus). If you want to digitize records seriously then ideally you have a selection of sizes and try them out to find the best one. That's what George Blood does. Have a look at the Internet Archive first. You may find your records have already been digitized which will save you time.

[Valvepower]

Hello,

Again, thanks for the replies, it’s really appreciated.

I was going to use the Audio Technica AT-VM95SP as I have a standard AT-VM95E cartridge with Elliptical Stylus so all I need is it to get is the AT-VMN95SP 78RPM stylus and use that. It also tracks at 5g. Anyway, the VM95 seems a workhorse and looks OK for the job.

Stuart, many thanks for the heads-up about the Internet Archive. I had a quick trawl and a good percentage of the 78’s appears to be there. What I may do is make the persons involved aware of the archive, however, I’ll copy over ‘say’ only the top ten favourites from the actual 78’s her late husband had so I can say the Top Ten are from the actual records themselves. There is fine line between sentimentality and practicality

Seeing I have a suitable solid state phono amplifier I can easily modify; I’ll probably give the solid-state preamplifier route with a basic tone control post the preamplifier and EQ a bash, however the QC11 and some valves still appeals though!

Yeah, you can EQ it in Audacity – I suppose fitting an ‘flat EQ’ setting is a sensible move. Maybe old-school habits die hard in wanting to do the EQ using hardware.

As I said, I’ve found the coarse grove 78RPM EQ time constants of 3180, 450 and 50uS – As a starting point I can pop these into the Lipshitz tables to derive the values based on the 78RPM time constants for my EQ circuit topology and take it from there.

Again, thanks for all the replies.

Terry

[Bobdger]

Stuart. Thanks for the link to https://archive.org/details/georgeblood.

Bob

[ben]

Before spending time digitizing, check on archive.org and youtube, many 78s have been digitized well already.

For anyone doing it themselves, a selection of 78 styli and carts can help get the best sound /least surface noise from the records. Since the bandwidth, especially top end, is limited anyway there's no need to spend a fortune on hi-fi kit.

[Ted Kendall]

Originally Posted by ben

Since the bandwidth, especially top end, is limited anyway there's no need to spend a fortune on hi-fi kit.

True, the bandwidth of recorded signal is restricted, but that of the surface crackle is not, so the electronics must be adequate in terms of HF response and overload performance if this is not to be squashed into the wanted sound.

[bluepilot]

Originally Posted by Ted Kendall

True, the bandwidth of recorded signal is restricted, but that of the surface crackle is not,

That's also a good reason for doing a flat transfer and equalizing afterwards. Treble boost on recording followed by treble cut on playback was a way of reducing noise and crackles. If you want to process the data to remove noise and crackles then it's better to do it whilst they are still there. If your cartridge has a frequency response up to say 20kHz then any signal with a 20kHz component is something that you don't want, like a click. If you performed a treble cut, i.e. equalization on transfer then the high-frequency components will be reduced and harder for the processing software to find.

[Techman]

I fully agree that I wouldn't spend valuable time on digitizing 78s when it's likely that someone has probably already done it. When I was younger I thought that making tape copies of old 78s was a good idea, but now I wouldn't waste my valuable time on it. I can pretty much say that even with what I thought were the most obscure records, that when I checked on-line, that someone had already uploaded a copy somewhere. Even if some of the recordings are not to the standard that you would ideally like, they'll probably be good enough for the lady in question to appreciate them.

Personally, I think it would be better to get up and running either her former husbands record playing equipment so that she can enjoy playing the actual records in the same way that he once enjoyed playing them, or supplying a working vintage player that she can use for that particular purpose. Obviously I don't know the current situation regarding this lady, so the above suggestions may be out of the question in this particular instance.

[Ted Kendall]

In practice, application of the treble component of a recording characteristic has little effect on DSP declicking or decrackling - well, not on CEDAR anyway - but then these are usually simple time constants with 6dB/8ve slopes and minimum phase characteristics. Treble filters, with their sharper slopes and complicated phase shifts, are another matter and should be avoided if there is downstream DSP.

[Valvepower]

Hello,

Yes, there is as an argument for using modern ‘OP amp’ design techniques in the preamplifier, thus not hindering the ability of Audacity to effectively apply its digital tools. Doing the EQ in Audacity also make sense… However, there is still that itch to use something like a Quad 22 preamplifier.

As per the replies/posts by Stuart (Bluepilot), which pointed me in the direction of the George Blood Internet Archive of 78’s proved to be fruitful as nearly all the 78’s I was going to copy are in the archive. I’m indebted to Stuart for this information.

I’m going to copy over the ones that aren’t in the archive (so far, we’ve only fund one that isn’t there) and personally take care of the top twenty-five favourites, a couple of which I’ll also copy over to digital. However, this will still leave roughly 270 78RPM records to find a home for

Now, the question is: does anyone know of a specialist collector or organisation who would be interested in them in one lot. This is tentative and I’m just reaching out for ideas as to finding a possible home for the rest of the 78’s.

I’ve come into the loop late-on in the saga of these 78’s, which started before the pandemic, so I have no idea of the exact situation and what equipment they were played on, that’s if it’s still around. I’ve come in at the point where the 78’s needed playing. There is also a bit of a back story to this which I can’t discuss at present.

Regards
Terry

[ben]

Originally Posted by Valvepower

H
Now, the question is: does anyone know of a specialist collector or organisation who would be interested in them in one lot. This is tentative and I’m just reaching out for ideas as to finding a possible home for the rest of the 78’s.

There are dealers who buy whole collections, but they tend to be interested only in specific types of music. So if there's nothing of interest to them they will either turn it down or offer you very little.

A key thing here is the genre. Examples of collectable ones are early jazz, rock 'n' roll and blues, Elvis, calypso, and some less common swing.

Date: In a general sense, very early (pre-1920s) or very late (late 50s even 60s) tend to be collectable.

Non-standard and novelty discs are what some collectors go for.

The likes of Mario Lanza, opera/tenors, Bing Crosby, Frankie Laine, choirs, most classical, light male/female vocal, you will struggle to shift.

The HMV, Decca, Columbia and Brunswick labels tended to sell in very large quantities so you'll likely have fewer rarities on those. Most records from the '40s and '50s don't tend to have great value.

It might be best to put a listing on eBay, as that will reach the widest demographic. Who knows, you might be pleasantly surprised.

Perhaps if you post some pictures ( or post a representative sample of titles) it will give us an idea of what we're dealing with and can point you in the right direction.