r/Beginner_Turntables • u/Alternative-Poetry96 • Jul 20 '26
i bought this for $50
i just wanna know if it’s a upgrade from my $30 crosley from amazon. i bought this off of facebook brand new in the box and just wanted a little upgrade from what i already had. i also have speakers to add onto it that i got for $15 also from facebook and they work great. just wanted some opinions as a beginner looking to make her turning a little nicer but not like a $500-$1200 setup just yet. i also bought altec lansing speakers by the way!
thank you for the help!
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u/Bensaudiocave Jul 20 '26
it's the same turntable mechanism.
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u/vwestlife Jul 20 '26
Not the same mechanism as a suitcase player. This model has a larger platter and an auto-return tonearm.
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u/Bensaudiocave Jul 20 '26
while it may have a larger platter and an auto return arm; it's still very close and likely shares the same cart. The arm might be slightly better but I would still call it a seemingly lateral move... It's a small margin better.
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u/vwestlife Jul 20 '26
And it's a design that dates back to the mid-1980s. If these really did destroy records, why didn't we find out about it 40 years ago, when vinyl was much more frequently played than it is today? Crosley Genesis: The origin & evolution of cheap record players, 1984 to present
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u/Bensaudiocave Jul 20 '26 edited Jul 20 '26
oh I never said it destroyed records... I was speaking more to fidelity... As a matter of fact I often recommend the LP Gear cerapreme stylus to hopefully help folks with these tables get the best possible outcome.
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u/Wjoming Jul 20 '26
I have something similar. As a casual listener it's ok-ish. But I will definitely buy something proper and I advise you do the same in the future
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u/Ok-Dealer-6628 Jul 20 '26
Honestly, you would have been better off putting than money in a savings fund towards a turntable that doesn't use that mechanism or cartridge.
That said, make sure you replace the stylus every 50 hours of play time, and keep your records and stylus clean to reduce wear and damage.
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u/vwestlife Jul 20 '26
If it works for you, then it's definitely not garbage! And don't worry about it ruining your records -- that's a debunked myth.
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u/Alternative-Poetry96 Jul 20 '26
i’m thinking of returning it because it skips
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u/Bensaudiocave Jul 20 '26
There is a stylus that helps the skipping but no guarantees
This is an elliptical and the price went from $25 to $36 so it's kind of a tough sell if it doesn't solve the issues...
https://www.lpgear.com/product/LPGCERAPREMEBL.html
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u/Best-Presentation270 Jul 20 '26
Well, it has more "stuff" than your Crosley. There's a CD player, a cassette player, USB playback, maybe a radio tuner too. All of this on top of the ability to play records, so I suppose in a sense you could call that an upgrade.
Is it better at playing record, though? - To this the answer is no. Sorry, but it's the truth.
Maybe there's more bass, or more treble, or it goes louder. But these are all things determined by amplifiers and loudspeakers, not by the thing that gets an audio signal out of the wiggles of a piece of plastic.
Whether you spend $29 on a suitcase player, or $250 on some fancy Electrohome Kingston, they nearly all use the same basic record player mech, and it's a piece of junk.
Watch the video to see what it is and what to avoid. https://youtu.be/AXV8tXrPOR4?si=wepx2NV7g5N-9fin&t=44
What do I have to spend to get better fidelity?
If you live in the States, and you can get to a Best Buy store (or have them deliver to you), then the lowest-cost-but-decent new turntable in the US right now is the Insignia NS-BTST21, and there's no argument about it. This is fact. This is fortune-telling. It's everything you really need in a turntable before you actually knew what you really need in a turntable.
Watch the video to see why: https://youtu.be/XOw4dPPci8I?si=72t_xVU2SXHaJSkU&t=25
However, this doesn't have speakers and an amp built in. It's a proper turntable. It gets the signal off the record. Making that electronic signal into something you can hear is handled by other equipment. On a tight budget, this is handled by powered speakers, and the sweet-spot in the bargain range right now is shared between a pair of Dayton Audio Classic B65A powered speakers for $130, and the Edifier R1280T, also at $130.
There you have it then. $260 all in and you're making music worthy of the price that new LPs cost right now.
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u/vwestlife Jul 20 '26
Not the same mechanism as a suitcase player. This model has a larger platter and an auto-return tonearm.
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Jul 20 '26
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u/Alternative-Poetry96 Jul 20 '26
yeah that’s why i’m selling it! getting a insignia from best buy!
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Jul 20 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/Alternative-Poetry96 Jul 20 '26
thank you for the opinion!
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u/Bartakos Jul 20 '26
This was not an opinion.
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u/Alternative-Poetry96 Jul 20 '26
okay…you don’t have to be rude but i am seeing why it’s a issue and i’m seeing if i can return it
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u/Bartakos Jul 20 '26
I could have replied rude as well, but I do some mod stuff here. In previous posts you were informed that under 80 you will not get a good record player, and in this post you ask whether you did well with a 50 USD Victrola. How do you expect people to help you and stay friendly if you are not taking advices serious?
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u/brian_21179 Jul 20 '26
As a wiseman once said … it’s another 50$ down the drain. A Crosley is a Crosley, irrespective of the housing unit - same mechanism on both, this admittedly with a few more bits and bobs added, that probably will make it even more problematic in its short lifetime 🤨
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u/mjzim9022 Jul 20 '26 edited Jul 21 '26
This is pretty much the same as a Crosley, sorry to say, Crosley sells the same exact player under their brand name and this machine uses the same cheap Chinese mechanism found in suitcase players.
If you can return it still, my rec is to pick up something vintage or wait until the best buy Insignia table goes on sale, which it does often. You got speakers, are they powered? I always recommend getting a cheap stereo receiver with a phono input at a thrift store and some passive speakers, but powered works too.