Copper


Drive, He Said Part 5

Issue 96VINTAGE WHINE

In Part 4 of this series, the last turntable mentioned was the unusual Mag-Lev levitating turntable. It was first offered as a Kickstarter crowdfunding campaign, and has now joined the Crowdfunding Hall of Infamy as yet...

Drive, He Said Part 4

Issue 95VINTAGE WHINE

In previous installments of Vintage Whine, we’ve looked at belt-drive turntables, idler-drive turntables, and direct drive tables. This column deals with the unclassifiable, the weird, the mixed-genre, the “what the hell...

Drive, He Said Part 3

Issue 94VINTAGE WHINE

Part 1 of this series in Copper #92 covered idler-drive turntables; part 2 in issue #93 examined belt-drive tables. In this installment, we’ll look at direct drive turntables…and yes, they did exist before the Technics SP-10 was...

Drive, He Said Part 2

Issue 93VINTAGE WHINE

In Part 1, Copper #92, we looked at idler-wheel turntable mechanisms. In this article, we’ll look at belt-drive turntables. The original Edison phonographs—cylinder players, not disc players—were belt-driven. Oddly, the first belt-drive turntable...

Drive, He Said Part 1

Issue 92VINTAGE WHINE

Vintage Whine has previously looked at the micro-mechanics of record playback in the 9-part series, 50 Ways to Read a Record, which appeared in Copper issues #65-74 (and sorry, I’m not linking to all nine...

Paper

Issue 91VINTAGE WHINE

It’s everywhere. We take it for granted, blow our noses on it, wipe…. and yet, paper has been a vital part of sound reproduction from the earliest days. Despite the...

Quintessence

Issue 90VINTAGE WHINE

Sometimes you encounter stories where it turns out that the story you think you want to tell, is just a very small part of a much bigger story. This is one of those stories-within-stories....

Fairchild, Part 5

Issue 89VINTAGE WHINE

We’ve spent a fair amount of time and pixels on the brand Fairchild (part 1 in issue #75, part 2 in issue #76, part 3 in issue #77, and a sidebar/part 4 in issue #82), but there...

The Fire

Issue 88VINTAGE WHINE

I’m going to deviate from the standard Vintage Whine topics just this once—because just as important as the heritage of innovation and genius in the creation of audio gear is the heritage...

Empire, Part 3

Issue 87VINTAGE WHINE

[Previous installments on Empire were in Copper #84 and #86—Ed.] It’s ironic that I’ve ended up writing articles about audio history, as I always found school courses in history incredibly boring. The standard presentation was that...

Empire, Part 2

Issue 86VINTAGE WHINE

  Our first installment on Empire mentioned the beginnings of the company in phono cartridges and tonearms, soon followed by turntables. The jump from record-playback gear to loudspeakers is not one that many audio...

Empire, Part 1

Issue 84VINTAGE WHINE

The primary reason I began writing these articles (and a similar blog on Audiogon, back in another lifetime) is that there are few cohesive sources of information about the history...

Fairchild: Sidebar

Issue 82VINTAGE WHINE

As I indicated in my first installment on Fairchild, back in Copper # 75, part of the enjoyment of researching these articles is ending up somewhere completely unexpected. As the series of articles went...

Vintage, Vintage Whine

Issue 80VINTAGE WHINE

There was a time in my life, not so long ago, when I spoke to longtime writers and editors who described the experience of cranking out an article in a...

New Old Stock

Issue 79VINTAGE WHINE

Newbies to the audio world encounter a lot of puzzling terminology, some of which seems oxymoronic. One such term that took me a while to understand is NOS—New Old Stock....

Fairchild, Part 4

Issue 78VINTAGE WHINE

The last three Vintage Whine columns have looked at the pro and consumer audio companies owned by Sherman Fairchild, with a side-look at his many other holdings. We began in Copper #75 with Part 1; Copper#76...

Fairchild, Part 3

Issue 77VINTAGE WHINE

As I’ve indicated in the previous installments of Vintage Whine in Copper #75 and #76, the story of Sherman Fairchild goes far beyond the realm of audio, and at some point really should be detailed in...

Fairchild, Part 2

Issue 76VINTAGE WHINE

In Copper #75, we began the story of the remarkable business empire created by Sherman Fairchild. Fairchild started over 75 companies, and as much as possible, we’ll focus on those directly involved in...

Fairchild, Part 1

Issue 75VINTAGE WHINE

I truly enjoy the research involved in these pieces, refreshing faded memories, absorbing facts overlooked or misunderstood in my youth, and especially—ending up somewhere completely unexpected. That’s how I came...

50 Ways to Read a Record Part 9

Issue 74VINTAGE WHINE

In Copper #73 we discussed an interesting but purely theoretical  method of scanning phonograph records with a laser. We’re about to look at a real-world product—more or less— which plays records using a...

50 Ways to Read a Record Part 8

Issue 73VINTAGE WHINE

In earlier installments of this series, we’ve focused upon the various types of phono cartridges—pickup cartridges, if you prefer. Though wildly different in their internal construction, all these cartridges have...

50 Ways to Read a Record Part 7

Issue 72VINTAGE WHINE

We’ve looked at a variety of methods of making music—or at least generating a signal— from a record groove. We’ve seen phono cartridges that use coils and magnets, all kinds...

50 Ways to Read a Record Part 6

Issue 71VINTAGE WHINE

As we know from old issues of Popular Science and similar mags that were full of hovercraft “you can build in your basement!!”—once a technology becomes mature, adventurous experimenters try to side-step that...

50 Ways to Read a Record Part 5

Issue 70VINTAGE WHINE

In our last installment, we saw the beginning of  the transition from monaural records to single-groove stereo records. Even today, software changes often require similar changes in hardware— we’ve discussed how the change...

50 Ways to Read a Record Part 4

Issue 68VINTAGE WHINE

In our last installment, we looked at the range of record groove sizes that were used through the years, and we jumped ahead a bit to the launch of Stereo. In...

50 Ways to Read a Record Part 3

Issue 67VINTAGE WHINE

It’s difficult to explain the basics of a highly-technical process like record playback without getting bogged down in eye-rolling minutiae. I’ll try to stick to the big-picture trends and details,...

50 Ways to Read a Record Part 2

Issue 66VINTAGE WHINE

In his last column, Jay Jay French mentioned the optical phono cartridge cartridge made by DS Audio in Japan. Ironically, “DS” stands for “Digital Stream”…go figure. When you hear of an optical method...

50 Ways to Read a Record Part 1

Issue 65VINTAGE WHINE

I’ve spent half a century immersing myself in the history of recorded sound. Recently I’ve had to go back to the very beginning and start over: I’m in the process...

What Will Be "Vintage" in 2068?

Issue 64VINTAGE WHINE

As I’ve discussed/ranted many times in this column, to me, “vintage audio” means, oh, 1968 and earlier. One hopes, much earlier. But I’m old. If you look at any craigslist...

"New Old"?

Issue 63VINTAGE WHINE

The first time I heard the word “oxymoron,” I thought it was a detergent for the intellectually challenged. No, really. For those unfamiliar with the term, it means a phrase...

Electric City

Issue 62VINTAGE WHINE

So: what does a professional audio nerd do on a day off? Check out an audio dealer, of course! I’d seen Craigslist ads for Electric City in Westminster, Colorado, for months–and finally...

What's a Speaker? And What's a Driver?

Issue 61VINTAGE WHINE

You know how annoying it is when you’re surrounded by a group of surgeons or securities traders or physicists or whatEVer and you realize that their conversation is filled with...

The More Things Change....

Issue 60VINTAGE WHINE

Oh, you think you’re so smart, Mr. 21st Century Hi-Tech Man. You know all there is to know about your fancy-schmancy stereo gear, you’re an expert at marketing it on...

Nagra

Issue 59VINTAGE WHINE

The history of Nagra begins, as is often the case in audio, with the tinkerings of one man. Stefan Kudelski was a Polish emigre’ whose family fled the Nazis and eventually landed...

Hadley Labs

Issue 58VINTAGE WHINE

At Axpona a few weeks ago, friend and mentor Richard Schram of Parasound suggested to me that, given my dual citizenship in the worlds of racing and audio, I should look at...

More Stuff About Old Stuff

Issue 57VINTAGE WHINE

Within the span of a couple weeks, I went from a vintage equipment show, Vintage Voltage, to Axpona, a show with a ton of brand-new gear where the only vintage items were...

Vintage Voltage: A Photo Feature

Issue 55VINTAGE WHINE

Researching and writing theoretical and historical pieces is a lot of work, and can get a little dry. As a change of pace, I present pics from Vintage Voltage, a local...

What's Past Is Prologue

Issue 56VINTAGE WHINE

The older I get—and at this point, I’m as old as dirt— the more I become aware that there is very little objective judgment in life. The one thing I...

Speakers Are Exhausting

Issue 54VINTAGE WHINE

“For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.” For engineers, Newton’s Third Law of Motion is both blessing and curse. In audio, the law is primarily of concern...

A Serious Hobbyist

Issue 53VINTAGE WHINE

In Copper #52 we began poring through a collection of audio ephemera gathered by Dr. James McVay, the grandfather of fellow columnist Duncan Taylor. Dunc brought in a binder full of material from the...

The Mysterious Binder

Issue 52VINTAGE WHINE

I wrote about ephemera back in Copper #37. In that column I wrote (and I’m quoting myself because I don’t think I can say it any better now): “I also learned that there was...

15,000 Pages!

Issue 51VINTAGE WHINE

I started reading when I was 3. I say that not to evoke any particular reaction in the reader, but just to make clear the fact that I’ve been reading...

Editor’s Choice

Issue 49VINTAGE WHINE

No, not this Editor. Continuing from my last column, inspired by the arrival of a big batch of old issues of The Absolute Sound, The Editor referred to is TAS‘ founder, HP—Harry Pearson. For...

Equal Time

Issue 50VINTAGE WHINE

In Copper #48 I began the perusal of a hefty box of old issues of The Absolute Sound, kindly sent by Australian reader Ian Lobb (and again, goodonya, mate!). Last issue I focused on the influence of TAS‘ founder...

Fractured

Issue 47VINTAGE WHINE

While sight-seeing around the uncommonly-empty campus of the University of Wyoming in Laramie on Thanksgiving weekend, girlfriend Pat and I flipped around the meager offerings on FM radio. Between  strident...

Is Older Always Better?

Issue 46VINTAGE WHINE

My daughter Emily has a habit of being brutally frank, direct, and unambiguous. I can’t imagine where she gets it. She recently said to me, “Dad, when something sucks, saying...

Materials Science

Issue 45VINTAGE WHINE

I’ve danced around this subject before, with my discussions of tone and wood. Back a million years ago in my college days, I majored in mechanical engineering, focusing on internal combustion engines and...

Tone Control (or lack of it)

Issue 43VINTAGE WHINE

I’ve previously mourned the death of tone in modern audio gear, and written about wood in audio gear. As far as I’m concerned, we’re talking about two sides of the same coin. There was...

Stereo at Sixty

Issue 44VINTAGE WHINE

We’ve heard a lot about anniversaries in 2017, with it being the 50th anniversary of Sgt. Pepper, the Summer of Love, the Stones’ Their Satanic Majesties Request, and much more. One anniversary that’s received...

Wood

Issue 42VINTAGE WHINE

Back in Copper #31, I wrote about the subject of Tone, and how it seems to have vanished as a topic of audio discussions—and really, from consideration as a vital element of audio design....