I have found that turntable designers typically fall into one of two camps. First are what I call the obsessive machinists. These are the people with impressive manufacturing chops and a sharp eye for fine detail and precision. For them, making a better turntable usually involves taking what we already know and simply doing it better. Whether it’s a thicker chassis, more powerful motor, more precise bearing, more effective isolation system, or something else, the emphasis is always on stepping things up a notch or two, rather than reinventing the wheel. This obsession can result in some impressive ’tables—some of the most impressive in the world, with awesome attention to detail. But are they the best sounding?
The other camp is what I call the deep thinkers. They approach the task of playing a record from a theoretical perspective and leverage their knowledge of physics to come up with fresh and innovative designs. The results may look unconventional, or even odd at first glance, but when such lateral thinking clicks, it can really push the boundaries of what’s possible.
The real killer combo is when both of these traits are present in the same person, which is how I think of Vertere CEO and designer Touraj Moghaddam. In the early 1980s, when he was studying for his doctorate in mechanical engineering at the prestigious Imperial College London, he became obsessed with making his own hi-fi system sound better. At a time when three-point, spring-suspended turntables like the Linn Sondek LP12 ruled conventional thinking on turntable design, he went back to basic principles to create something better.
The results were impressive, and in 1985 he founded Roksan Engineering and launched the Xerxes. The Sondek LP12 remained the dominant force on the UK high-end turntable market, but the Xerxes soon cracked that stranglehold, gaining favor with retailers, consumers, and even the fickle British hi-fi press of the day. The Xerxes’s combination of fresh thinking and high-precision manufacturing—both camps, together—led to a ’table many found
