![]() ![]() Linn has sold well over 100,000 Sondek LP12s over the years, and while there will be many that are no longer in use, or just acting like the vinyl equivalent of an old Mercedes 190E and still slogging on without repair or reset, there are tens of thousands still current, well-maintained, and being used in good systems. ![]() The thing about upgrades to the LP12 is there are so many of them in circulation. Trained vinyl-spinning masseuses will take your LP12, upgrade its Lingo, re-set the deck, and it comes back looking (and sounding) invigorated. Actually, it’s like taking the turntable to a health spa. On the other hand, any plinth made after 1984 (unless it was left in a sauna for a few years) could be brought to 2018 specification… there are almost no other products anywhere in the consumer electronics world that could make the same claim.Īs Linn has long made a big thing of not letting end-users mess around inside the turntable, describing the installation process is academic. It’s also likely that if you turn up at said dealer with a fully original turntable from 45 years ago, there are other upgrades along the way that might be more practical. Like every step in the development of the Sondek LP12, the Lingo 4 is entirely retrofittable, although it requires the work of a Linn-trained dealer to install and set it up. The main circuit board now sits under the Sondek’s sub-chassis (LP12 aficionados with long memories might recall this as the place where the Valhalla power supply used to be mounted), the motor needs to be replaced, with the speed reference eye mounted close to the new 12V motor, and the old power supply box gets radically slimmed down to be just a nondescript switch-mode power supply that is designed to be hidden from view. Physically, there are several changes between Lingo 3 and Lingo 4. Couple this with both the Radikal’s feedback system (a sensor mounted near the motor reads a mark on the inside of the outer platter), and more decoupling between motor and top-plate, and the precision of the system is clearly audible. The new Lingo 4 creates a precision sine wave in the digital domain, which is converted to analogue and amplified to drive a new AC motor. That ‘something more’ involved a move to digital. However, while the idea of referencing the actual speed of the platter to the motor is a good idea, on the AC motor used in a Sondek LP12 that alone doesn’t open up a whole can of ‘better’. This lived up to the name in that it made the fairly radical move from an AC to DC motor, using a calibration system that measured from the turntable sub-platter itself, and required a full-sized Akurate or Klimax power supply box. However, there were many lessons to be learned from the Radikal power supply, launched in 2009. The original Lingo dates back to 1990, and – although it went through two significant changes in the intervening 28 years – the basic filtered twin crystal oscillator circuit in an external power supply box was very much in the ‘if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it’ camp. The Lingo is the Akurate level power supply, an upgrade to and more, erm, accurate than the relatively simple Majik unit, but not as precise as the DC motor system deployed on the Klimax level Radikal power supply. Regardless of product, Linn’s lines are neatly sub-divided into Majik, Akurate, and Klimax: not so much ‘good, better, best’, more like ‘best, bester, bestest’. Although the afromosia plinth is gone, the new fluted plinths are available in black ash, cherry, oak, rosenut, and walnut. For those new Lingo or Urika II buyers, the company is also reissuing a classic, limited edition fluted version of its plinth. The other big part of the celebration – the Urika II phono stage – is the subject of next month’s test. Linn’s evergreen classic Sondek LP12 turns 45 this year, and the latest version of the Lingo power supply is one big part of its birthday present. ![]()
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