The Smiley Smile Message Board

Just a quick one.

I changed the needle on my Sony turntable today (it has a fixed cartridge, btw) because the old one had bent all the way to the right without me noticing. But now, the new one transmits a low rumbling sound (ie, not pops or crackles or normal vinyl detritus) throughout the entirety of a record. It sounds like you can hear the needle moving through the grooves much louder than before, to the extent that it sounds like its scraping the record if unamplified. I thought it might be that the old needle had f*cked my records, but it's still there on brand new unplayed vinyl.

Help?! Maybe it's something to do with the output level of the turntable (it has a switch for such things) not that....

Check and see if you have a an adjustment for tone arm tracking. If so, you may need to adjust it so that the arm and needle set more lightly on the record. This knob is at the base of the tone arm.

^what drbeachboy said: I had the same problem - got a new needle for my player and didn't re-adjust the arm to compensate for the added weight - it sounded terrible.

I adjusted the weight and it has sounded perfect ever since.
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If that's not the case, make sure you connected the wires to your needle-cartridge correctly. I'm very new to this stuff so I may have the terminology wrong! So sorry in advance!

EDIT: Just re-read that you have a fixed cartridge...so nvmd. :-\

EDIT!

Turns out accidentally moving my record player about a half inch whilst changing the needle was responsible. So we have learned that A) turntables are fickle beasts and B) I'm an idiot  :lol

Thanks anyway!

(sigh of relief) Hope you didn't damage any of your records. If you ever have problems, these guys http://www.turntabletreasures.com are really good. I bought a turntable from them last year, the previous one lasted me about 20 years.

For some reason, I chose BWRG to test it out on. But it's fine!
RE: the site.... That's good to know, after I get paid a bunch this summer I'm going to buy me a new and nice record player.

Erghghhh.... I spoke too soon. Now it's just doing it at the end of the records.

The thing is, it's a little box with the needle just poking out from under it. and the box is scraping the record..... It's doing my head in - trying to lift the tonearm with blutack and it's still going on. And there's no way to sort it because it's cheap as f***.

Sigh.

This is the kind of thing I lose sleep over.

Good luck with getting the problem fixed. I think I might have the same turntable...generic black plastic Sony.

It's getting to be the sort of thing where you fix one problem only for another one to arise. It turns out the 'thingus the stylus slots into' had been turned, without me realising it could be - hence the stylus dragging. So I think now I've turned it straight, and it doesn't drag across my records.

But....

Now the tiny wobble of my turntable that never bothered my old stylus is causing the new one to go crazy all over the place and distort the sound every rpm. I think I'm going to go crazy.

In case anyone still cared, two days of not using the turntable is apparently enough to cure wobbling. What kind of deep voodoo does this thing operate on?!

I doubt it was voodoo - I'd say you turntable was just feeling dizzy and needed a few days inertia to recover

I used to own one with similar problems.