$400 dollars no anti stake and a sloppy gimble I'm sorry but that's way too much. Not being able to easily balance the tone arm is a classic sign of a cheap or improperly adjusted gimble (bearing screws too loose or too tight) in any case this should NOT be a thing at this price point. If you're looking for a turntable in this price range I'd recommend a used SL1200.
Secondly, the SL1200 is perhaps one of the most overrated turntables out there. Is it audiophile grade? With its moderately heavy medium-mass arm and rumbly direct drive motor not really. That's because Technics prioritized longevity over fidelity. These were built for high hour use in clubs and radio stations, not for domestic use.
Watching this was nearly as fun as actually taking the unit out of the box and testing it myself. Probably more fun, because I could eat at the same time, and not making smudges on the unit. Great video. The combination of the smoked/tinted dustcover and the clear plinth totally ruined the visual. Absolutely no no no. It's like a pair of eyeglasses with one tinted lens. I wonder- what is the difference in manufacturing cost- what costs more? Acrylic or the composite wood particle stuff? I'd imagine the acrylic takes more skill. But, I don't really know. Maybe these pieces come from a mold and are simple to make. Thanks for the great show!
That RetroLife ICE1 acrylic turntable is a jewel for sure and with its reasonable-sounding Audio-Technica AT3600L cartridge, although the platter wobble disturbs me a bit as well as that visual defect in the acrylic platter, not to mention having to adjust the speeds with a pitch control to fine-tune 33.3 rpm and 45 rpm playback when this turntable is getting up there in price comparable to entry level turntables by U-Turn Audio, Fluance, etc. Two other suggestions I would have for RetroLife are to use a clear or silver power cord and a clear rubber belt if possible to maximize the transparency of the unit to not have black cords or belts undermining that cool, minimalist, clear diamond-like appearance. However, none of those observations is a deal-breaker when one will likely be playing mostly black vinyl records on the platter anyway. Thanks for demonstrating and reviewing this turntable, Record-ology. :)
If I was designing a budget turntable I'd put an Ortofon Omega on it, great as the AT 3600L is, I think the Ortofon looks a little classier and has an elliptical stylus for not that much more, they retail at about $35-40.
I forgot about that cheaper Ortofon cart. That's what I should get for my at record player. I use the Blue on my Pioneer player. But your right... that Ortofon is worth the few extra bucks.
In the early 1970’s, Ampeg made an acrylic bass/guitar. Today, these are highly collectible. From what I remember, early models had the acrylic yellow over time. I think this corrected with later models. By the way, only the body of these instruments was acrylic.
The Plastic Fantastic beats it up value and sound wise perhaps? Thanks for mentioning my Tinted not Smoked comment. I got a smile out of that. Thanks for the vid. Very candid and to the point.
Not a bad video so thumbs up for that. For those with a large color/clear vinyl collection this would look sleek as heck. The sound to me was also "okay" as well. However for $400 though there should zero plastic on any part of the tone arm including the head shell, a better built in pre-amp, the head shell should be removable too, and there needs to have anti skip. The price is not in the budget friendly class, and so it needs to have these basic things in that price range regardless. As a nit pick a white belt would have been a better choice than the black belt due to it being a tad clashing with the all clear look. If this was $200, or less I would personally buy it even with it's faults, but paying $200 more for the gimmick of it being all acrylic dose not justify the cost. Acrylic is not a rare/difficult material to work with so there is no excuse for the premium price with budget grade parts (mostly the tone arm area). Heck they are using the same tone arm as there $200 HQKZ-006 model. Just because Audio Technica can get away with their price hikes dose not mean the other budget friendly guys can. BTW I don't like that AT can do that either, but people will put up with it due to their positive reputation (which is rather dumb in my eye).
I have had experience with a component stereo that had a turntable from back in the day. When I replaced the needle/cartridge for it, the left channel was lower, there were even times it cut out. Eventually, I got myself another record player which allowed me to replace the cartridge and headshell if needed.
That does look cool. What else would be cool is to take one of the mult-color LED strips and have it shine through that unit. Still as cool as that is, I think I would still spend the extra $100 and get the Fluance RT-85 (which, BTW, does have an acrylic platter).
Love the look of the acrylic. Almost invisible. Preamp on turntables always concern me. Thinking about swapping my 4 year old cork mat for an acrylic. Thanks for the video!
30 or 40 years ago we bragged about solid silver cables and titanium+zirconium double-walled arm tubes... My rig had (and still has) a low-end titanium inside, magnesium alloy outside with utterly pedestrian Ortofon copper wiring. Friends laughed at it "why won't you switch to rhodium you silly peasant?"... 2024: "please don't tell me it's plastic..."
ABSOLUTELY! Its a very good sounding album and that's why its such a good test record! Also, I put a link to Laura's music in the description - stay tuned for another update video that really shows the best of this album!
Additional Comment: Playing a glow in the dark record (or a clear vinyl record - with, or without a label) would really look nice on this one! So would any other colour I'd think!
I would be interested to know what the sound quality is when using the output set to phono and using a phono pre-pre-amp. Is the slight channel imbalance still present when using this setting. Also, did you happen to test for any anti-skate. If it does not incorporate it perhaps that is the cause of the channel imbalance if the TT was not on a completely level surface.
Oh boy. . . another manual turntable. Is it possible to get a new turntable: 1) fully automatic like on vintage TTs, 2) S-shap tonearm with counterweight, anti-skate, and vertical adjustment, 3) Standard 1/2" removable headshell. And to get all that for around 300 to 350 dollars US?
Some people may disagree with me, but I prefer DD over belt. No anti-skate, you only can only switch one stylus for the original one and you can't change the cartridge to a better one. It looks cool, but no go for me. One question. Can you change the headshell on 3600?Anyways, have a good week my friend.
Looks cool but for $400 - $350 it should have two speed trim controls, 33 1/3 and 45 and that platter should have less wobble and no flaws. Could care less about the built-in BT and phono stage. Put the money saved on those back into quality of turntable, arm, platter, motor and feet. For that same price you can buy a Rega P1 Eco (Eco models have flaws, usually in the plinth, that have no effect on performance. I bought one earlier this year and the blems I fixed so they (2) are barely visible, even up close. Then there's brands like Orbit, Fluance , Pro-Ject, Audio Technica and several more name brands, some below $200.
A few ideas for this one: To fit the weight to the end of the tone-arm it may be better to fit this before fitting the dust cover? Perhaps it is possible to press down where the belt fits into the motor shaft, thus ensuring the fit is correct to stop the belt riding up/down; just a thought! Retro Life (is shown on the manual), so these might be sold under this branding also? Also did you notice the error on the outer box? Where it states 100 pcs? LOL. (I'd guess that outer box is used for something else too?).
Nice review! With all the turntables you've reviewed that feature the AT3600L, you must have purchased one of the many aftermarket styli for it, like the Pfanstiehl 4211-DE, the -D6, the -D6T, or the LPGear CFN3600LE. I particularly love the latter, it's a brighter livelier sound compared to the stock stylus. Any thoughts?
May I recommend you test the anti skating on these kind of turntables that don't have an adjuster for it? Sometimes it really comes well adjusted and others it doesn't, would be really cool to see if it is well, thx!
Great overview but that’s not a good turntable. Definitely not worth the price tag. The strobe disc jamming that was funny 🤣.But you got it off,did fair better with the actual record you put on there.Bluetooth is nice gimmick for the table but it doesn’t save it from its speed settings being out there,adjusting for speed on different records is not good. Cover shouldn’t be out of sync either.And the plastic head shell what were they thinking???. It looks good but it has too many flaws to justify price tag. For the money. I would get an LP120 and you could get a LP60 as well for second player and still come in under budget for the price of that Record player. Thanks buddy for all the great content.
In my opinion, there are a few too many problems with the unit. Not being able to adjust the tracking by 'floating' the arm seemed unacceptable to me and having just one speed adjustment when there was always going to be the possibility of one speed being fast while the other being slow seemed short-sighted, as I'm sure that adding a second speed adjusttment wouldn't have added much to the cost. The cover not being square with the base also seemed to further indicate insufficient attention to detail. In short, I feel it could have been so much better.
This turntable is for people who want to have this on their shelf more than actually want to use it. When you can get a Fluance 81+ for $300, this just makes no sense for a record enthusiast.
Ehhh... seems kind of cheaply made to me. It's shame because it looks really cool. But way to much other record players out there that are more functionable as far as quality goes. I do like that auto stop feature though. That would save some needles.
Eh only if you want the clear aesthetic. The audio Technica brand equivalent is $2500 so in that sense it’s a great deal. But as far as similar priced turntables compared to this - I would say probably not.
Sorry, but the sound was shockingly bad… it’s as though there was no riaa EQ, which might just tie in with the very low output level. It sounds as though your Zoom was acting as the phono stage.
Recording on the MIC input, common. There is no RIAA equalization , that is why it sounds thin and flat. Worthless test. Test the pre-amp section and buy a decent recorder with a real line-level input. I have the Tascam DR-7, older one but has a real line-level input, great machine. Most people don't have a phono input stage so to test the sound quality of this device and record those two other outputs. A wow & flutter test is also a welcome addition. Speed control at the back of the device, is really stupid design decision, not very practical. To me it looks like a gimmick, it looks cool. I think they need to improve the design to satisfy the hefty price. You mention APT-X but you forgot to mention that the BT-receiver used have to support this codec, not all devices support this. What about latency for example.
That tonearm is crap, more play in it than I have seen on any table. The simplist thing to remember, if a turntable has a USB connector- it's not a real turntable. It's not about analogue and your just wasting your time. One may as well stream or listen to cd's. it might look ok, but still not about quality at all
All looks but no substance! To many flaws that could all have been avoided if they’d set it up properly and not skimped on quality for the actual playback components. That’s definitely an avoid unless you want a clear ornament 🤷🏻♂️
I love the way this TT looks its solid 400.00 is not too bad but I do not like the play tone arm has it moves too much for my taste but I would buy this than buying the fluance cause the fluance is very hollow yet some of their models cost the same as this one and both are made in china ,and I used your idea of playing record on acrylic platter it does sound great i only wish the color of tone arm and the silver parts werer a little darker or different that silver color looks too silvery it makes look cheap ,I think black would make this look better ,you also mentioned that the cover for tt was off a bit if yopu go to the back where hinges are located there will be 1or 2 sers of screws where you can losen and readjust and tighten the hinges a little better the c-10 has the same hinges and I had to adjust tighness and realign the TT cover just a bit so I hope that is the same set up as mine but I love this TT looks really classy just a few minor things but it is very nice looking JRo
JUST REALIZED I MADE A MISTAKE! Check out my follow up video coming soon!
I appreciate that you didn't pull any punches. Great looks, but too many flaws for $400.
$400 dollars no anti stake and a sloppy gimble I'm sorry but that's way too much. Not being able to easily balance the tone arm is a classic sign of a cheap or improperly adjusted gimble (bearing screws too loose or too tight) in any case this should NOT be a thing at this price point.
If you're looking for a turntable in this price range I'd recommend a used SL1200.
A large number of classic AR turntables lacked antiskate...
You hit right on the nail Bush!
Secondly, the SL1200 is perhaps one of the most overrated turntables out there. Is it audiophile grade? With its moderately heavy medium-mass arm and rumbly direct drive motor not really. That's because Technics prioritized longevity over fidelity. These were built for high hour use in clubs and radio stations, not for domestic use.
just love the 45 adapter plugs, I giggle every time
Beautiful crystal clear recordplayer !!
Thanks for explaining all the details. Plenty of useful information.
Yea. I think he explained to me why not to buy it.
Classic Record-ology ! Oh yeah........ 😎👍
That thing looks pretty cool.
Watching this was nearly as fun as actually taking the unit out of the box and testing it myself. Probably more fun, because I could eat at the same time, and not making smudges on the unit.
Great video.
The combination of the smoked/tinted dustcover and the clear plinth totally ruined the visual. Absolutely no no no. It's like a pair of eyeglasses with one tinted lens.
I wonder- what is the difference in manufacturing cost- what costs more? Acrylic or the composite wood particle stuff? I'd imagine the acrylic takes more skill. But, I don't really know. Maybe these pieces come from a mold and are simple to make.
Thanks for the great show!
Wow, that looks gorgeous
It really is!
That RetroLife ICE1 acrylic turntable is a jewel for sure and with its reasonable-sounding Audio-Technica AT3600L cartridge, although the platter wobble disturbs me a bit as well as that visual defect in the acrylic platter, not to mention having to adjust the speeds with a pitch control to fine-tune 33.3 rpm and 45 rpm playback when this turntable is getting up there in price comparable to entry level turntables by U-Turn Audio, Fluance, etc.
Two other suggestions I would have for RetroLife are to use a clear or silver power cord and a clear rubber belt if possible to maximize the transparency of the unit to not have black cords or belts undermining that cool, minimalist, clear diamond-like appearance. However, none of those observations is a deal-breaker when one will likely be playing mostly black vinyl records on the platter anyway.
Thanks for demonstrating and reviewing this turntable, Record-ology. :)
If I was designing a budget turntable I'd put an Ortofon Omega on it, great as the AT 3600L is, I think the Ortofon looks a little classier and has an elliptical stylus for not that much more, they retail at about $35-40.
Elliptical stylus demand very clean grooves. Have a good method to clean records.
I forgot about that cheaper Ortofon cart. That's what I should get for my at record player. I use the Blue on my Pioneer player. But your right... that Ortofon is worth the few extra bucks.
@@larrylarry1 thats why I invested in a wet vac system to clean my records. I buy used all the time so it's a good investment.
very sharp looking turntable i really like the headshell
In the early 1970’s, Ampeg made an acrylic bass/guitar. Today, these are highly collectible. From what I remember, early models had the acrylic yellow over time. I think this corrected with later models. By the way, only the body of these instruments was acrylic.
The Plastic Fantastic beats it up value and sound wise perhaps? Thanks for mentioning my Tinted not Smoked comment. I got a smile out of that. Thanks for the vid. Very candid and to the point.
😀
Not a bad video so thumbs up for that. For those with a large color/clear vinyl collection this would look sleek as heck. The sound to me was also "okay" as well. However for $400 though there should zero plastic on any part of the tone arm including the head shell, a better built in pre-amp, the head shell should be removable too, and there needs to have anti skip. The price is not in the budget friendly class, and so it needs to have these basic things in that price range regardless. As a nit pick a white belt would have been a better choice than the black belt due to it being a tad clashing with the all clear look.
If this was $200, or less I would personally buy it even with it's faults, but paying $200 more for the gimmick of it being all acrylic dose not justify the cost. Acrylic is not a rare/difficult material to work with so there is no excuse for the premium price with budget grade parts (mostly the tone arm area). Heck they are using the same tone arm as there $200 HQKZ-006 model. Just because Audio Technica can get away with their price hikes dose not mean the other budget friendly guys can. BTW I don't like that AT can do that either, but people will put up with it due to their positive reputation (which is rather dumb in my eye).
I have had experience with a component stereo that had a turntable from back in the day. When I replaced the needle/cartridge for it, the left channel was lower, there were even times it cut out. Eventually, I got myself another record player which allowed me to replace the cartridge and headshell if needed.
first upgrade: A-T VM95 cart. The 3600 isn't 'bad, per se, but the VM95 is an excellent, cost effective improvement.
Which VM95 stylus ? If it's the conical 95C there's no point in that. If it's at least the nude elliptical 95EN, then maybe.
You can add LED strips etc. to the turntable to make it look amazing.
That does look cool. What else would be cool is to take one of the mult-color LED strips and have it shine through that unit. Still as cool as that is, I think I would still spend the extra $100 and get the Fluance RT-85 (which, BTW, does have an acrylic platter).
Stay tuned!
@@Recordology Aww maan! If you do rig up some LED lights on that thing, I GOT to see it!
Headshell, cartridge, and just the tonearm in general look cheap for for $400
Something better then regular black and grey/white
Love the look of the acrylic. Almost invisible. Preamp on turntables always concern me. Thinking about swapping my 4 year old cork mat for an acrylic. Thanks for the video!
Pro-ject 6-perspeX Balanced Pick it MC3, its nice dudes
30 or 40 years ago we bragged about solid silver cables and titanium+zirconium double-walled arm tubes... My rig had (and still has) a low-end titanium inside, magnesium alloy outside with utterly pedestrian Ortofon copper wiring. Friends laughed at it "why won't you switch to rhodium you silly peasant?"...
2024: "please don't tell me it's plastic..."
Hope everyone who watches this one will watch the follow-up and not think our album actually sounds like that!
ABSOLUTELY! Its a very good sounding album and that's why its such a good test record! Also, I put a link to Laura's music in the description - stay tuned for another update video that really shows the best of this album!
Many thanks, I like it ✌️👌
Additional Comment: Playing a glow in the dark record (or a clear vinyl record - with, or without a label) would really look nice on this one! So would any other colour I'd think!
Were there any precautions about placing the turntable in direct sunlight ?.
I would be interested to know what the sound quality is when using the output set to phono and using a phono pre-pre-amp. Is the slight channel imbalance still present when using this setting. Also, did you happen to test for any anti-skate. If it does not incorporate it perhaps that is the cause of the channel imbalance if the TT was not on a completely level surface.
Totally awesome buddy not sure it's worth $400.00 but cool
Should get a clear Vinyl such as Taylor Swifts clear LP to go along with the clear theme.
Oh boy. . . another manual turntable. Is it possible to get a new turntable: 1) fully automatic like on vintage TTs, 2) S-shap tonearm with counterweight, anti-skate, and vertical adjustment, 3) Standard 1/2" removable headshell. And to get all that for around 300 to 350 dollars US?
They also set the cartridge way back on the head shell I don't know why and what the over hang should be for that cartridge but it doesn't look right!
Some people may disagree with me, but I prefer DD over belt. No anti-skate, you only can only switch one stylus for the original one and you can't change the cartridge to a better one. It looks cool, but no go for me. One question. Can you change the headshell on 3600?Anyways, have a good week my friend.
I believe some expensive turntables are made by Project, Audio Technica, and Michelle Gyro.
Looks cool but for $400 - $350 it should have two speed trim controls, 33 1/3 and 45 and that platter should have less wobble and no flaws. Could care less about the built-in BT and phono stage. Put the money saved on those back into quality of turntable, arm, platter, motor and feet.
For that same price you can buy a Rega P1 Eco (Eco models have flaws, usually in the plinth, that have no effect on performance. I bought one earlier this year and the blems I fixed so they (2) are barely visible, even up close. Then there's brands like Orbit, Fluance , Pro-Ject, Audio Technica and several more name brands, some below $200.
A few ideas for this one: To fit the weight to the end of the tone-arm it may be better to fit this before fitting the dust cover? Perhaps it is possible to press down where the belt fits into the motor shaft, thus ensuring the fit is correct to stop the belt riding up/down; just a thought! Retro Life (is shown on the manual), so these might be sold under this branding also? Also did you notice the error on the outer box? Where it states 100 pcs? LOL. (I'd guess that outer box is used for something else too?).
Upgrade the cartridge alignment properly, a decent photo preamp and then we'll see what it sounds like🤔🎵🎶
Nice review! With all the turntables you've reviewed that feature the AT3600L, you must have purchased one of the many aftermarket styli for it, like the Pfanstiehl 4211-DE, the -D6, the -D6T, or the LPGear CFN3600LE. I particularly love the latter, it's a brighter livelier sound compared to the stock stylus. Any thoughts?
I have put on a Pfanstiehl 3 mil stylus for playing 78s on my PLX500.
Dust can run, but it cannot hide 😂
beautiful turntable but its better direct drive my opinion
the warped platter is a no deal for me. to bad. the unit looks nice.
isn't the perimiter of the record the same thickness as the center?
May I recommend you test the anti skating on these kind of turntables that don't have an adjuster for it? Sometimes it really comes well adjusted and others it doesn't, would be really cool to see if it is well, thx!
We have a follow up video plan to compare preamps and will include the anti-test as well
@@Recordology Cool! Thx for the response!
Great overview but that’s not a good turntable.
Definitely not worth the price tag. The strobe disc jamming that was funny 🤣.But you got it off,did fair better with the actual record you put on there.Bluetooth is nice gimmick for the table but it doesn’t save it from its speed settings being out there,adjusting for speed on different records is not good. Cover shouldn’t be out of sync either.And the plastic head shell what were they thinking???.
It looks good but it has too many flaws to justify price tag.
For the money. I would get an LP120 and you could get a LP60 as well for second player and still come in under budget for the price of that Record player.
Thanks buddy for all the great content.
if the new cartridge is an ATN 3400 the anti-skate should still be fine
3600L but it pulls - I could feel it.
In my opinion, there are a few too many problems with the unit. Not being able to adjust the tracking by 'floating' the arm seemed unacceptable to me and having just one speed adjustment when there was always going to be the possibility of one speed being fast while the other being slow seemed short-sighted, as I'm sure that adding a second speed adjusttment wouldn't have added much to the cost. The cover not being square with the base also seemed to further indicate insufficient attention to detail. In short, I feel it could have been so much better.
This turntable is for people who want to have this on their shelf more than actually want to use it.
When you can get a Fluance 81+ for $300, this just makes no sense for a record enthusiast.
the rubbish slack tonearm is a deal breaker ,shame it just looks nice...
Ehhh... seems kind of cheaply made to me. It's shame because it looks really cool. But way to much other record players out there that are more functionable as far as quality goes. I do like that auto stop feature though. That would save some needles.
Do you think it is worth the $400 price point?
Eh only if you want the clear aesthetic. The audio Technica brand equivalent is $2500 so in that sense it’s a great deal. But as far as similar priced turntables compared to this - I would say probably not.
Link to purchase?
In the description
The lid looks stupid with that missing branding plate why didn't they just have the lid fully smooth. It looks like you've lost the the label for it.
No anti skate? That’s a hard no.
Out of the box, it’s kinda trashy. Needed some work to make it sound OK. I own it and I don’t recommend it.
Sorry, but the sound was shockingly bad… it’s as though there was no riaa EQ, which might just tie in with the very low output level. It sounds as though your Zoom was acting as the phono stage.
Recording on the MIC input, common. There is no RIAA equalization , that is why it sounds thin and flat. Worthless test. Test the pre-amp section and buy a decent recorder with a real line-level input. I have the Tascam DR-7, older one but has a real line-level input, great machine. Most people don't have a phono input stage so to test the sound quality of this device and record those two other outputs. A wow & flutter test is also a welcome addition. Speed control at the back of the device, is really stupid design decision, not very practical. To me it looks like a gimmick, it looks cool. I think they need to improve the design to satisfy the hefty price. You mention APT-X but you forgot to mention that the BT-receiver used have to support this codec, not all devices support this. What about latency for example.
The RIAA is added at the preamp stage not my recorder.
Nope. Not for me.
The platter wobble and fixed headshell did it for me.
For 400$ I expect better sound than that. Needs more engineering. More for a look than actually sounding good.
Ick ...no
That tonearm is crap, more play in it than I have seen on any table. The simplist thing to remember, if a turntable has a USB connector- it's not a real turntable. It's not about analogue and your just wasting your time. One may as well stream or listen to cd's. it might look ok, but still not about quality at all
I could really used this in prison
All looks but no substance! To many flaws that could all have been avoided if they’d set it up properly and not skimped on quality for the actual playback components. That’s definitely an avoid unless you want a clear ornament 🤷🏻♂️
Looks like you're paying more for looks than performance and build quality with this one, unfortunately.
I love the way this TT looks its solid 400.00 is not too bad but I do not like the play tone arm has it moves too much for my taste but I would buy this than buying the fluance cause the fluance is very hollow yet some of their models cost the same as this one and both are made in china ,and I used your idea of playing record on acrylic platter it does sound great i only wish the color of tone arm and the silver parts werer a little darker or different that silver color looks too silvery it makes look cheap ,I think black would make this look better ,you also mentioned that the cover for tt was off a bit if yopu go to the back where hinges are located there will be 1or 2 sers of screws where you can losen and readjust and tighten the hinges a little better the c-10 has the same hinges and I had to adjust tighness and realign the TT cover just a bit so I hope that is the same set up as mine but I love this TT looks really classy just a few minor things but it is very nice looking JRo
A 20 dollar cartridge on a 400 dollar turntable....hmmm
Quite common actually...