It would be a diamond needle in a soundproofed room, of course.

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For one thing, I was starting to get an image of all this kit being bought by someone with a single armchair in just the right spot between the speakers, and a solitary test record.

"Surprised they let you have it in this room anyway, the acoustics are all wrong. If you raise the ceiling four feet... put the fireplace from that wall to that wall... you'll still only get the stereophonic effect if you sit in the bottom of that cupboard."
(Flanders and Swann, "A Song of Reproduction")

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I was starting to get an image of all this kit being bought by someone with a single armchair in just the right spot between the speakers, and a solitary test record.

Ah, I didn't realise you'd met my ex ;)

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He must have had several clones in my form at school.

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You forget the ones who insist on buying gold wiring rather than copper and having said wiring raised a precise measurement off the floor to make sure the vibrations of people's feet don't interfere with the quality of sound.

I sadly have overheard this conversation several times on public transport and facepalm each time.

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Didn't forget - didn't know about. Didn't need to know, either...

I'm content that all the spaghetti at the back of the TV, Skybox, DVD player, DVD recorder, VCR (yeah, still have one), amp and external speakers is plugged into the proper holes and doesn't shoot sparks at the cats when I throw the switch. I invested in one of those multi-scart blocks, the ones with push-buttons, and had to draw a chart to show which combination of buttons allows which thing to talk to which other thing without having to rewire the lot. I've got it about right, and the resulting sound quality is "more than adequate", which is enough for me.

D & I once visited the house of a Hollywood friend-of-a-friend, who proudly showed off his new THX home cinema system ("Installed by the guy who did it for Lucas". Given this guy's reputation, that was probably true enough.) But because he'd got the volume cranked up to commercial cinema levels, my ears weren't able to decide if it was worth going to all that trouble. Since this took place (that evening, anyway) in in a living-room with everyday furniture, bookshelves etc. rather than a purpose-built viewing room, I don't think so.

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I am showing my age here by recalling the Not The Nine O'Clock News "Hi-fi shop" sketch.

Rowan Atkinson: Hello, I wonder if you can help me, I'd like to buy a gramophone.
Mel Smith: Gra-mo-phone?
Rowan Atkinson: Yes, I'd like to buy a gramophone.
Mel Smith: Sorry grandad, but I don't think we've got any gra-mo-phones in.
etc...

That said, I'm sitting here with an Akai turntable on the shelf above my head, and a Pioneer amp under my monitor, desultorily doing the same job of digitising a box of vinyl. Both were given to me on my 18th birthday, which makes them very nearly 26 years old, and still working perfectly. I sold the Wharfedale speakers on eBay a few years ago, when I realised that I would never use them again. They still sounded fantastic too.

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I'm reminded of the Rob Buckman article where he talked about getting seriously into hifi but gave it up when he worried about hearing the glue in the speaker enclosure

also there was a nice piece in the Skeptic magazine many moons ago (vol 3.4) which looked at the pseudoscience related to hifi systems. This went beyond the realms of oxygen-free cables and green markers (draw a ring around the edge of your cds and it reduced laser scatter) and into a bizarre theory about having to have an odd number of corners in your system. Thus you had to cut a corner off each of the different pieces of kit and this even extended to the album covers so that they had five corners instead of four

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IIRC, the cut corners on the album covers was a sign they were remaindeered or cheap Mexican imports, and could not be sold for full price, according to a friend who ran a vinyl shop back in the day (black walls, posters of Motörhead, Saxon, Judas Priest and Deep Purple on the top of the walls and ceiling - the whole stereotypical kaboodle, but it wasn't stereotypical in 1983). I can imagine someone being ashamed of having bought a cheap album come up with the "odd angles" thing as a smokescreen.

The Technics tape deck here still works brilliantly, as does the Arcam amp and Tannoy speakers, but the trusty old Dual record player gave it's breath up a while ago. It still works, but there's a leak somewhere which gives a loud monotonous humming (I'd guess 50 Hz, from the mains) after up to a minute's play.

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Peter,

Have you seen the gizmo at this link?

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/381598-REG/ART_USB_PHONOPLUS_V2_USBPhonoPlus_v2_Audio_Interface.html

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Not that one specifically, but it;s like many of the greeblies that install between the turntable and the PC. D claims that one of our own music-transfer programs has a similar sort of filter built-in, so we'll only look for an add-on if said filter doesn't work well enough.

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LPs? I've still got 78s somewhere.

Okay, they were my dad's, but I keep telling myself I'll ebay them on that elusive Someday.

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We used to have a couple of boxes of 78s in the attic of the old house, but like much else they went away during the move after my Dad died in 1980; probably into a skip, but it took the next 6 months to realise what sticky fingers our "helpers" had...

Ah well, at least if they were pinched, someone may have got some use out of them. More than I'd have ever done.

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I haven't seen a peep out of either you or DD in weeks now. Everything okay over there? I only ask because it's unusual for both of you to be so quiet for so long at the same time.

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We're both getting over a foul case of bronchial flu (caught during our anniversary evening out, and there've been a couple of other health things going on. Not much interest in blogging.

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Ack. Get well soon then, to both of you.

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