Turntables, Arms & Cartridges

As standard, the Spyder turntable comes with a compact outboard supply (above, right) that provides the 24V for Brinkmann’s proprietary ‘Sinus’ motor and a secondary supply for the heated bearing assembly. An upgrade for the motor is available in the form of the £2795 RöNt II power supply (above, left) which employs tubes for both rectification and regulation. In this case, the valve lineup includes one 5AR4 full-wave rectifier feeding two high current, low resistance PL36 tetrodes – sufficient to deliver the 500mA required momentarily to overcome the platter’s inertia. Incidentally, the PL36 was originally released in 1956 and was designed for driving the line timebase output of CRT television sets, so its duties here are well within its compass. Indeed, Brinkmann even goes so far as to claim ‘the tetrodes are good for 10,000 hours under full load...’. Users will need to take care with the heat generated by the RöNt II however, and Brinkmann supplies an optional marble plinth by way of cooling. In all instances, the original PSU is still used to heat the main bearing. PM