Linn Sondek, Naim, LP12; fully Naimed LP12 rips, audiophile FLAC

In order to reduce the number of active seeds I have got going, I have decided to compile some of them under one umbrella. Sure it will be a longer download, but its either that or I have to start deleting some of them.

This is a collection of vinyl rips I made with what was at the time, a top-of-the-line Naimed Linn Sondek LP12. Which is to say it was powered with a Naim Armageddon supply and equipped with the Naim Aro tonearm, fitted with the Naim inspired Lyrica Helikon SL moving coil cartridge that went directly into a Naim Supercap powered Prefix K built in moving coil phono stage. The outputs from a Naim NAC552 preamp was sent into the analog inputs of a CD-recorder.

All equipment was powered with pure balanced AC power via a 200+ lb, 10kVA Equitech transformer with dedicated earth spike. Monitoring was conducted with Naim DBL speakers, althought that is unimportant-especially as the volume was turned way down so there would be as little acoustic effect on the turntable as possible. The turntable was housed in a converted walk in closet next to the audio room, but still...the less acoustic vibrations the better.

And the LP12 was sited on a two level Mana Reference wall stand. Final turntable tweaks were conducted by a very senior member of then Naim team.

The music is mainly individual tracks from my modest LP collection along with some 12" 45 rpm 1980's era EP's. BTW, I got 45 rpm out of the LP12 by giving it a regenerated higher frequency AC power from a PS Audio mains regenerator. Ths avoided having to use a sound degrading 45 rpm adapter pulley ring, or even a Linngo supply.

One folder includes a 'shoot-out' comparison between this Linn Sondek and a much modified very budget turntable, with identical tracks from the identical albums. The LP12 had the Naim phono stage detailed above, but the budget deck used a tube phono stage that cost 600x what the turntable did!! Its not always 'source first'.