78 r.p.m. records
 

Hello people. Does some ones owns and playes 78 r.p.m. records? I wonder how they are compared - in term in durability and sound to the vinyl records? Do some of them sound decent?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oF2zQNGUKPc

I no longer have any 78s. The surface noise of shellac records was always much greater than vinyl. Modern noise reduction techniques can reduce it quite a bit when transfering to digital media, usually without modulating the music unacceptably, but for direct play, high-cut is about the most you can do.

I know of one radio host that would play a blank shellac track in the background of his announcing. This would accustom your ear to the noise so that it would be less noticeable on the old records.

Now that my old ears roll off starting at 3 kHz, the noise wouldn't bother me as much, but I still listen to old records from digital transfers.

I have a few 78s. I don't really listen to them, per se, I just have them to demonstrate my Victrola. I'll tell you one thing, though, I was surprised at the sound quality and volume a mechanical record player can muster. Once I had the reproducer rebuilt and adjusted properly, without any electronic amplification, I can hear the music playing in the basement from upstairs. I have some shellac records that sound good, and I have one that's really worn out. The later records that I think are not shellac, sound much better. Granted, vinyl albums are going to sound better, just on principle alone.

But yeah, I was pretty surprised.

I've been into Big Band/Swing music most of my life so I have a collection of 78s. Probably around 200-300 but I haven't catalogued them yet the way I catalogued my LP collection earlier this year.

One thing I know about most 78s is don't play them on equipment with HiFi era amplification...If the equipment doesn't roll off the high frequency enough the record noise will be too distracting.

I have a few VDiscs that appeared to never have been played on heavy tracking phonos that have very little scratch compared to most used 78s I've owned. What really chews them up is mechanical phonographs and some of the pre-War electrical pickups that tracked heavy.

The 78 rpm records should only be played using a 3 mil stylus, diamond or sapphire. Nearly all record players up through the mid-60s had a 78 rpm speed selection and flip-over cartridge with the right-sized stylus. Play a 78 with a .7 mil std styles for 33-45 and it sounds awful.

78 rpm records on older players with a crystal cart will sound appropriate considering the state of the art until 1950s. I have repaired post-war vintage radio-record combinations (Philco M6 player and V-M 400 player) at request of customers who know this.

Play them on a 1950s-60s equipment with a ceramic cart and they are not as pleasant but not overly scratchy.

New or like new 78s played on reasonable equipment can be very listenable. Played with a modern replacement ($20 at thevoiceofmusic.com) cartridge into a modern hi-fit setup with even a "mean" shelf equalization can sound better than that.

Even 115 year old records can sound quite good IF they are "like new", which usually
means that they were very unpopular ones.

78s can survive playing even at 50 grams with a steel needle IF the needle is changed
every few records. But they will never be quite the same as new.

A tip in finding good records to use as demos: 78rpm.com auctions. You are much more likely to get excellent surfaces at reasonable prices if you pick classical records,
especially multi-record albums.

I'm listening to the Brahms 4th symphony with the Boston Symphony and Koussevitsky right now on an Admiral 1950 changer that I got at last Sunday's ETF auction for $5 .. and a nice great shape Bakelite case to boot. It cost about $7 to recap and about $20 for a thevoiceofmusic.com KCCD replacement cartridge kit.

It does however need a new idler wheel without a bump in it .. another $30 at thevoiceofmusic.com.

78s are goregous sounding...... I love them!!

I like 78s, they have a unique sound of ther own :music:

I use a GE VRII Triple Play on a Japanese Gray 108 clone on my Rek O Kut turntable makes for good sounds. A true mono cart with a legit 3 mil stylus helps with the surface noise

There where some turntables (record players) that had a rotating needle - one side for micogrooves, the other for 78 r.p.m.
I wonder if the sound from here is true: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oF2zQNGUKPc
If I get me some records (trough all that I have nothing to play them on), I must found some in decent state.
Oh, I do have some. Soviet and Romanian. One day I tried to push one on the axle a non-working record player that some one gave it to me... it cracked pretty fast.

That's basically the sound quality my good period equipment gives me. Some gear and records will be better, some will be worse.

I seem to recall Mercury records in the early to mid 50s being mastered with very high dynamic range and fidelity, I bet a minty fresh copy of one of their new releases on an early Hi-Fi system configured for 78s would sound pretty close to an LP.

There were companies that produced microgroove 78s for HiFi after most commercial 78 production ended. One was here in Wisconsin in the 60s.
There's a company called rivermont that's making vinyl stereo 78s currently...I've thought about buying one from them.

Wait a minute, there are 78 r.p.m. microgrooves discs?
If the sound is as good on YouTube, I want to try some 78 r.p.m. Not as good as 33 or 45, but still intresting.

There were niche market microgroove 78s...they are rare though.

Here's a YouTube video of a capeheart turnover changer that definitely uses the actual audio from the phono.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=nBQWZ4IwaKk

I have the pre-War revision of that capeheart mechanism (just the mechanism though) that I hope to find/make the missing pieces for and make work someday.

Well, I'll be God's. Just a few moments ago I was looking for record changers and camed across wounderfull machines like that one - I even entered the video from the link. But I did'nt put the sound on. To be hones, they sound better then I imagine. I will try to find some forgein 78 r.p.m. in good shape.
The ones from the '30's probably don't sound that good, but still better then you imagine.
Oh, yes, I want me one of those machines. As cool as a line casting machine for printing industry.

78s actually are quite fun to listen to. If you play them back on good equipment, the sound quality is very enjoyable and surprisingly realistic. They're also very much the closest thing to time travel, because it's possible to hear performances from people who were in their prime 100+ years ago! You need to do some research though, and make sure that the stylus is correct, and that you aren't using RIAA eq, because that will usually make them sound quite bad. High and low pass filters are also a requirement.

I know about R.I.A.A. But I wonder if '50's - early '60's turntables (record players) that had 33 and 1/3, 45 and 78 r.p.m. had necesarly R.I.A.A.?
The stylus most no be for microgrooves or what do you mean?

A standard stylus for microgroove records (LPs) will sit in the bottom of the larger 78 groove. The results are horrible. Purists will have a range of styli for 78s, choosing the one that works best with a given disc. I use a Shure N75-6 stylus (in a Shure M75 cartridge) which is a good compromise for most 78s. Not sure of its exact size.

RIAA equalisation will make most 78s sound bass heavy. You can do an approximate correction with tone controls or build a pre-amp with switchable EQ. A few pre-amps such as the Quad 22 had switchable EQ as standard. Ordinary record players that could play boht LPs and 78s didn't have such switching. You just used the tone controls to get the sound you preferred.

Once LPs had settled on RIAA that was usually the only equalization circuit in the system, but there were some exceptions.

I have a Fisher (IIRC model 50C) that is a mono tuner/phono preamp and it had a few switchable equilization options I think they were RIAA, EUR, 78, and possibly something else...I don't do a lot of mono listening so that Fisher has been in the closet for a good 5-10 years now.

No because your listening digitally (You cant hear how it really sounds)

So it isn't the original sound from the record...

A blanket statement that you aren't hearing the original quality just because the YouTube posting is digital is wrong. It depends on what was done to make the video.

If the sound for the youtube video is being picked up by a microphone in front of the loudspeaker, then the mic arrangement and room acoustics can affect the result much, much more than digitizing the signal ever could. However, the audio may have been processed to reduce noise, which would make a big difference as well.

So, are you interested in the overall result using the vintage phonograph? That may be what you have here. If you want to know the quality of the record and cartridge output, then you need a recording of the equalized signal. Again, straight digitizing without additional processing will not contribute any audible effects.

Disclaimer: using too low a bit rate for the audio could produce audible effects.

In this video you can definitely hear the level of distortion typical of recorded music of that time, which the digital processing does not contribute to in any audible way as far as I can tell.

I'd advise against taking seriously any comments written by dude111. I've read them for the past 10 years, more for amusement than anything. Some of the crazy stuff he believes is hilarious...for example the dude won't update to anything newer than windows 98 (or was it XP?) Because he read some cock and bull tall tale that there's some kinda mind control digital noise baked into the newer opperating systems. He believes all digital audio and video is terrible. And if you read his replies to threads he started to ask how things work it becomes evident he has close to no technical knowledge, and even less aptitude.

He's good for cheerleading, necro-posting to 10+ year dead threads (if you can even call that a good thing) and seat warming his account here.

I kinda think of him as the only bot that hasn't been kicked off VK for being a bot.

Ah Dude111 is alright, he annoys audiophools and know-it-all types on other forums I haunt. I’d buy him a beer or..erm maybe a chocolate milk or instant ice tea :yes:

Anyways here’s what I play 78s with. A GE VRII with a turn around rather than turn over stylus. Push down to flip between LP and 78. It has no vertical compliance so NO playing stereo records with this one

I got this replacement for a Cobramatic in a 1956 Zenith "Rhapsody" https://www.thevoiceofmusic.com/cata...th&Categories=

I Then advised the new owner of this equipment that he cannot play stereo records. It would not be hard to swap in a stereo cart but why do this for a pre-stereo unit?

GE carts seem to be a favorite though I have never seen one in the wild.

The older 78 RPM only Zenith Cobras were really good quality phonos...I have a table top model and it has very good tone and seems to pick up less surface noise off of worn records. Wurlitzer even used the cobra pickups in their 1100 and other models of jukebox.

Some of the 4 speed changers did have a funky "compromise" stylus that was in-between the standard 78 and 33 tip sizes.

I have one of these, a 10" 78 RPM record made in late 1970 that was part of a promo package given out to radio stations promoting the new at the time Uncle Charlie And His Dog Teddy album. I have nothing to play it on after I sold my Dual 1219 years ago. When I DID have a turntable capable of 78 it sounded great, high dynamic range for sure.

http://www.videokarma.org/attachment...1&d=1624631219

It's microgrooved or haves big grooves?

Ha! Yeah, next time I'm talking to the mastering engineer I'll ask ...☺

Pretty sure it was cut to "78" standards. It takes up the whole side for a 3 1/2 minute tune.

Im sorry Tommy but how are you gonna hear how beautiful analogue is if your listening digitally??

You cant.......

The record source maybe indeed by analog but listening over youtube we cannot hear it!! (We hear a digital translation which isnt in my opinion nearly as good)

Im not a bot,im a real person like you buddy...

This is for you Tommy,someone mentioned this on another thread im on (Different site)


Its not real listening digitally........ You cant hear the real sound......

With 78RPM the best scientific arguments against digital recording are basically moot (and non-scientiffic arguments are just some fool's opinion).

Let's use CD quality recording as an example, because it lacks compression (compression damages quality of digital recordings). 78s max frequency response usually topped out around 8-12KHz for the best copies. CD audio samples (instantaneously measures amplitude and records it as a data point) at 44KHz...The Nyquist Shannon sampling theorem states that to capture a frequency you need to sample it at atleast double the frequency, and the higher above the measured frequency you sample the better. With LPs where you could get upwards of 20KHz the highest frequencies are poorly sampled because they approach or exceed the Nyquist limit of 22KHz. But with 78s having a max frequency only half that 22KHz number they have effectively double the number of samples per cycle of what a digitized LP would have on their highest frequency and thus don't rub up against the sampling limit. 78s typically had fairly subdued dynamic range (difference between loudest and softest sound recorded) compared to even LPs (because 78s had higher surface noise) so CD quality has more than enough discreet amplitude levels to faithfully capture that.

And that's just CD quality audio...a standard nearly 40 years old! Nowadays there are digital recording standards that have much higher sampling frequcies that allow faithfully capturing audio frequencies so high humans can't hope hear them (which improves the number of samples in the audible range). These newer formats also have more discreet amplitude sampling levels than CD improving dynamic range. It's reached the point where you could AB test (or do the Pepsi challenge if you will) a quality LP and an uncompressed high quality digital recording of that LP and even an audience of sharp eared listeners couldn't tell you which is which...

You might be able to argue that with less than state of the art digital recording and a good master tape the digital is noticably worse, but against 78 RPM arguing that digital isn't capturing the sound faithfully is just plain silly.

Let me clue you into something if your playing a 78 that has been played before you aren't hearing the true sound of it either...Last time it was played the needle (probably in some heavy tracking windup machine 70-120 years ago) scapped off enough of the groove to see with the naked eye... resulting in high frequency undulations in the groove scraped clean off and replaced by noise, lower frequency wave shapes distorted and peaks chopped off or rounded.
The folks that complain that 5g tracking crosley phonos ruin LPs would have a stroke if they saw the damage most Pre-WWII equipment did to 78 records each play.

Yes alot of good points you have there!!!!!!

And the Cobras have to be replaced every time the stylus wears out. And they're getting very scarce, and very expensive.

A few months ago my dad got me an original victoria.......

It came with a bunch of 78s.... The needle is steel,notihng else can be played!!

I like the sound of my 78s better on my reg record player,that steel needle does not play it welll -- But I like having one!!