Well, if all goes right, my friend, who's become an avid linear tracking fiend, will be passing along a Technics Direct Drive- the early version of the 1200 with extra-massive plinth and heavier, bigger and wider platter, and with an SME arm.

The weak point of many of the early Technics TTs is the arm. It's not a terrible arm- but not the strong point of the table.


With the SME arm, that weakest of links is eliminated, and one is now in possession of one of the greater arms available at the time.



While this may not be a Linn/Ittok calibre table, for the very low price I'll get it for (hint- he's profiting off it, but he's a friend, and he only paid $60 off a seller who didn't know better), I think I can live with it for a while.




The big thing for me right now is ease of use. This SME has the swappable headshell, so I'll be able to try out my collection of Styli to see which one works best with my system- without the difficulties of having to unscrew the stylus from the arm every time.

Being limited in physical nature due to my injuries, convenience goes a long way. A big decision, along with a foolishly good price, for me to jump on it.

A sale of two of my TTs will cover the cost of this one, and probably leave some extra cash in my pocket to boot.




Wish me luck!

You've got a winner on your hands. I love the old Technics DD tables. I had a 1200 for years and recently got ahold of an SP10.

Good enough for me!

Well, the table arrived today, courtesy of my friend Derek.

It's an sl-1100 with the SME Improved.

Table is not holding speed, and Derek suspects it might be caps, but I'll give it a thorough cleaning first and see what that yields.

The arm is complete minus the bias weight and bias weight pully.