03 Connecting turntable to amplifier

Turntables can come with their own built-in amplifiers, or without. The amplifier is required because at the time of recording, when the grooves are cut, the lower notes are reduced in amplitude to reduce the width of the grooves, according to a standard equalizer algorithm, and this has to be reversed at the time of playback (I’m not an engineer, so you will have to read about it elsewhere (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gramophone_record is as good a place to start as any!). History of equalization is here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Gramophone_record&action=edit&section=32),

and RIAA equalization here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RIAA_equalization.

My turntable comes with speeds of 33, 45 and 78 rpm (revolutions per minute), which suits a wide range of gramophone discs (records), the favourite being of course the 33 (or more precisely, 33^1/3) LP (long-playing) discs, or vinyls (after the material used). The turntable has to be hooked up to the amplifier, which in my setup is a portable boom-box (which can be termed the receiver, as it receives the output from the turntable). Both the turntable and the receiver (the boombox) have the sockets required to insert the ends of the standard audio cables required. Many systems may not have these, or may use other types of sockets, which may call for adapters to connect the standard cables, so you may have to do a little mix-n-match to get it all set up! The sockets on the back of the receiver are colour-coded red and white to distinguish the right and left channels of the stereo output. 

The receiver has two pairs, for audio input (on the right) and output (on the left); more sophisticated integrated all-in-one systems may have further options for a MIDI device, video output, mp3, and so on.

The back of my turntable has only two sockets, and not colour-coded, for audio out.

Operation of your turntable must be familiar to you (you’re an audiophile, after all!), so all that’s left is to connect the two audio cables, for each of the stereo channels, from the back of the turntable to the ‘audio in’ sockets at the back of the receiver (amplifier or audio system). The cables, available at any electronics store, are called a ‘portable audio cable’ on my package, and the end of each is provided with a standard ‘RCA Male’ prong (red and white coded, and stuck together to stop you from going mad with all the tangling).

The other ends go into the receiver (the right-side pair back of my boombox, red and white).

The boombox (or music system or whatever you are using) has to have its ‘function’ or similar selector switched to audio input, usually labelled ‘AUX’ (for ‘auxiliary’, i.e. additional, attached, unit), or ‘PHONO’ (for gramophone), or something similar. Now if you play the turntable (obviously putting an LP on it, setting the appropriate speed, and turning it on and dropping the needle on to it the usual way), you should be able to hear it on the receiver.

Next is to connect the receiver to the line-in socket of your computer, the subject of the next post.