[Vintage-Audio] New Computer For Blind Wonder?

[Duane Fischer]

Heck no! This is my vintage Compaq Prosario 1210 P1 laptop that I paid
$2,000 for nine years ago. OUCH! But since my Super Computer, the Compaq
model 5100 business machine, has had another Psycho-Space Binary Brain
Blitz, five in twelve months, I am forced to revert to technology that I
actually understand! DOS and a $550 software program to tell you what the
ASCII value characters on the TV screen meant via synthetic speech, was
almost Fort Lauderdale, FL before the city council banished Spring Break
there! True! Sorry, that's another tale not to be told here -	
	
I was just curious if any of you remember how the Shure N-91ED stylus was
packed about ten to thirty years ago? Small hard plastic box with stylus
plugged into a plastic simulation of the tone arm cartridge? Or?	
	
I keep kearing of different packing methods from former dealers, no two
tales match. Now the old blind dude got his groove mileage, average was
what? About 2000 hours per stylus before retirement? Or was it playing time
of 2000 hours per year? Anyhow, I tracked in those days at 3 grams using a
Giarrard (how do you spell that record changer's name?) AT-50 in the
sixties. I once had to Scotch tape a Lincoln penny, weight of 4.11 grams
for the Numismatically impaired among us, to the top of the tone arm to
track an album by Folk singer Joan Baez. I am not sure what major label
recorded that album, but it would not track at the normal stylus pressures.
I think it went to white noise, or pink Floyd fuzz, about play number 14!	
	
I am trying to find a good working turntable, as mine is starting to show
some wear after 33 years. It is a Sony/Merantz 5520 from 1974 and has
performed beautifully! A middle of the road turntable? Maybe a few marks
higher. Some have suggested the Teac 5500, but I have 'NO' clue where to
find one that works, is complete and I won't have to auction off what few
spare body parts I still have that function so I can purchase the
turntable!	
	
If any of you own a good turntable, and have used it since last century,
what is it and how do you like it?	
	
Please do not suggest I buy one with the very helpful strobe light on it to
get the speed correct. I get a real rump ache Migraine skull thumper from
squintinting to see that stupid light! For the blind, Black Light rules!
(LOL!)	
	
Some of these records I purchased still sealed are a little warped. Like
this writer's sense of humor! On an ocean it is known as a wave. On a
turntable it is called stylus on trampoline! I tried to flatten them out,
as there was just no way to keep the stylus in the groove in the shape they
were in! I heated the album in an old toaster oven slightly on both sides,
then placed it on an old Websters unabbridged college dictionary and a
stack of fifty old Popular Electronics magazines on the other side to
privde an equal counterweight. Got a little too much heat, I think, darn
grooves merged in spots! I even tried the very ancient method of boiling
water dipping and then putting the album between two pieces of well planed
Pine and applying equal pressure with a hefty steel forged bench vice. I
must have gotten the album too warm, as the soft White Pine wood I used
became afixed to the record's surface. When I gently pryed it off, I
discovered that vinyl albums were laminated. It was flat now, but the
grooves were on the soft White Pine and did not play worth a darn!  	
	
So how did you resolve the warp issue?	
	
Duane W8DBF