Best sampling needle

There's nothing wrong with backcueing with an elliptical needle. I don't know where that idea came from. Stanton 680ELs were the standard cart for a long time and they were elliptical.

If you want some audiophile quality stuff look at Grado's offerings. They even make DJ carts.

bedouin wrote:There's nothing wrong with backcueing with an elliptical needle. I don't know where that idea came from.

I thought eliptical needles are **** your records up?

There's a lot of half-knowledge about that out there I believe. Some good info can be found here:

http://www.kabusa.com/str8_doc.htm
http://www.fl-electronic.de/analog/tonabnehmer.html

bedouin wrote:Stanton 680ELs were the standard cart for a long time and they were elliptical.

Oh, and that does not mean they aren't bad for your records...I don't think a lot of DJs care for that at all.

_Stilo_ wrote:

bedouin wrote:Stanton 680ELs were the standard cart for a long time and they were elliptical.

Oh, and that does not mean they aren't bad for your records...I don't think a lot of DJs care for that at all.

Spherical styli sit in the groove in a way that makes them stick better for scratching. That's really the only difference.

bedouin wrote:

_Stilo_ wrote:

bedouin wrote:Stanton 680ELs were the standard cart for a long time and they were elliptical.

Oh, and that does not mean they aren't bad for your records...I don't think a lot of DJs care for that at all.

Spherical styli sit in the groove in a way that makes them stick better for scratching. That's really the only difference.

Elliptical styli have sharper edges, that's why they are also not recommended for straight-arm turntables for example (because those have large tracking errors). So I imagine they could also be disadvantageous for backcueing.

_Stilo_ wrote:Elliptical styli have sharper edges, that's why they are also not recommended for straight-arm turntables for example (because those have large tracking errors). So I imagine they could also be disadvantageous for backcueing.

It's really negligible. Be for real, backcueing your record once, even with a cheap needle, isn't going to hurt anything. And once or twice is all you need when sampling . . .

There are DJ carts out there with elliptical styli for a reason; there are DJs out there who want that.

You want something to worry about? Worry about 45s that aren't actually made of vinyl. You can usually tell from the texture. Backcueing on those, regardless of stylus, also makes horrible cue burn.

The same people feeding you all this audiophile wizardly would shit themselves if they saw anyone touch the record let alone spin it backward on the platter.

bedouin wrote:

_Stilo_ wrote:Elliptical styli have sharper edges, that's why they are also not recommended for straight-arm turntables for example (because those have large tracking errors). So I imagine they could also be disadvantageous for backcueing.

It's really negligible. Be for real, backcueing your record once, even with a cheap needle, isn't going to hurt anything. And once or twice is all you need when sampling . . .

No doubt...I was more thinking of "real" DJ use For sampling I would use an elliptical myself of course.

It can never hurt to know what you're working with. It's up to everyone then to make sensible use of that knowledge. So, if I was to spin a one hour turntablism set, I would probably choose spherical needles for that.