Been wanting one of the new MMF-5 turntables. I am a little concerned about what Ive been reading here about motor freeze up. I found a good price at Music Direct $449.00
If I get one should I go ahead and lube the motor shafts anyway as sort of a preventive maintenance?
Anyone have any thoughts on this Id like to hear them.
If I buy one Ill give a reveiw after a few weeks.

Emil

This is my second turntable. To be fair, my old one was about 20 years old and was never much to begin with (no brand names mentioned). I have about 400 CDs and I think I'm going to trade them for cash and then buy %^&*loads of vinyl. I honestly can't sit down and enjoy a CD after listening to this turntable for a few hours. I tried everything from the John Coltrane "Heavyweight Champion" LP boxset, to Merle Haggard's "Swinging Doors." Half the stuff I have on CD as well, but there was really NO comparison. It sounds great.
I would recommend this turntable for anyone who is interested in UPGRADING their CD system, or for someone who has a stack of records and an old turntable that doesn't work anymore.

unbeatable price, very sweet and musical, simplicity and stately

Goldring Elan not in the same class, get a Grado Red and start really listening

Got the Music Hall from www.audioadvisor.com and have been enjoying it ever since. You've got to upgrade the Elan for a Grado Red and get the best sound for the money. The Elan is fine, but it is a spherical cone and can't keep up with an elliptical overachiever like the Grado Red, which AudioAdvisor sells at a market breaking $80. Shostokovich, Rachmaninoff, Gerswhin, Ella, Duke, Coltrane, they have all visited my listening room since the setup was completed. Go forth and invest in them and restart your vinyl experience.

Similar Products Used:

mass market cheap junk, rega planar 3(good but MMF has the price edge)

Excellent sound. Excellent design.

Cartridge that comes with it.

I finally have a good turntable! This turntable is inexpensive, but is designed very well. I was especially impressed with the low-cost, but effective motor isolation system. The sound is nothing short of amazing. I can now hear a level of clarity and dynamics that is impossible with mass market turntables, no matter what cartidge you use. I replaced the Goldring Elan cartridge, primarily because I don't want a spherical tipped stylus wearing out my records. I hooked up my Grado Black, which sounds far better than it did on my old (sony)turntable. If you are looking for a budget audiophile turntable, you must seriously consider this one. The Rega Planar 2 retails for $500, I got this for $230 (it retails for $300, but you should be able to get a discount). I doubt the Rega sounds any better than this (if as good). If you have a moderate sized record collection, you will not regret buying this turntable.

Similar Products Used:

Sony, Technics BD turntables.

The outright engineering quality for the dollar!

The pickup (Obviously a Ford,Ha,Ha) that came with the table does not do this little jewel justice! Easily remedied.

The last turntable I owned was a Denon PL-47F with a rosewood chassis and a $500.00 Signet cartridge which model # escapes my memory. I sold my system in 1992 and have not owned a TT until I purchased my MMF from the Advisor.

First a little background and though this will be long in type it will come together in the end. I started putting a listening system together in 1997 having gone without one for 5 years, and for a guy with 1000 pieces of vinyl and 500 pieces of byte plastic that's pure *^%$# if you know what I mean.

I want to give you a run down on my current equipment and keep in mind the last of my purchases was to be the TT!

EQUIPMENT LIST:

AMPLIFICATION:
Power=2xBAT VK-200
Pre=BAT VK3i
Phono=BAT VK P5
SPEAKERS:
B&W Nautilus 803's
SOURCE APPLICATIONS:
Rotel RCD-991
Yamaha MDR
MMF2

It looks as though I'm going to run out of room so let me just tell you that after I put a Grado Platinum on this table it was clear to me that I did not have to spend 2 or 3 grand on a TT setup.

This six hundred dollar TT setup walks all over my RCD-991 when it comes down to sheer detail. I thought when I first put this system together that people would look at all this equipment which most recently jumped on top of my new Lovan Ultimus rack and say you spent all that money on this system and that's your TT, but once they sat down and started listening to this little baby do it's thing they immediately ask me for one of my old copies of the advisor.

One of my good friends told me that if he would have known how good this $600.00 setup sounded that he would have put all the money he spent setting up his Gyrodec on more amplification for his Logan's. To me the Music Hall MMF2 is one of the best Hi-Fi values on the market today.

Similar Products Used:

The only thing I have owned that was close was an NAD with a flat carbon fiber tonearm made in the Chez Republic (1985)

A VERY impressive turntable for the money. Cleverly engineered to maximize bang for the buck in sound quality. I st up and auditioned the Music Hall MMF-2 in MY system for a friend. I am the happy owner of a late model Linn Axis (with the Akito tonearm)and a Sumiko BP cartridge. Before the Linn, I had a Dual CS-450 with a Grado Z1 (or something like that). The MMF-2 is a lot closer in sound quality to the Linn Axis, than was the Dual. Have to give it four stars overall, but as a best buy value, it's a five!

price

included cartridge, questionable build quality

I am a newcomer to the world of vinyl madness... the aforementioned SL-D2 truly changed my perspective on analog once the Grado was fitted to its tonearm. After months of enthusiastic listening, I decided it was time to try something in the "hi-fi" bracket-- albeit a starter piece-- to see how much better my life could be.

I auditioned the MMF 2.1 on the local shop's rig, which included an Arcam integrated and a set of JL Audio monitors. I knew from past auditioning experience that this setup was much less "active" than the B&K/Rotel/Paradigm setup in my own living room, but the 2.1 sounded pretty good on this rig. The shop set it up and I took it home, prepared to enter a new magical realm of analog nirvana.

Once I got it home, however, it was a completely different story. My initial impression was that I had just taken a massive step backward, sound-quality-wise. The first couple records I put on sounded harsh, even tinny, and the cartridge seemed to have massive difficulty making musical sense of even mildly loud passages. I tried to be open-minded and listened for another hour or so with a wide variety of source material ranging from U.S. Maple to Bach cantatas, but any time things started to "rock out" on the disc, it just sounded awful. Surface noise was also a great deal louder than I was accustomed to on my most familiar records, and I was suddenly acutely aware of each individual speck of dust stuck in the grooves in a most "unrevealing" fashion.

Finally, I did a digital capture (heresy!) of both the Technics and the MMF 2.1 playing the same passages from the same records in order to do some quick A/B'ing. I listened over and over to the same passages to try to find some good in the Music Hall's output. But in the end, the Technics mopped the floor with the MMF every time, with better noise rejection, better imaging, smoother response to transients, tighter bass with a much deeper extension, and a much more fluid tonality overall. Any potential sonic benefits of the Music Hall's arguably better tonearm or the "purist" belt-drive powertrain were totally lost in the distorted, piercing muck produced by the Goldring.

What's that, you say? "Change the cartridge?" Yeah, that's my beef exactly. I am definitely going to swap the Black onto the MMF 2.1 and see if that helps matters. The Goldring Elan is obviously a poor choice for my admittedly punchy system, and moreover my complaints closely resemble those made by other 2 and 2.1 owners that tried to live with the Elan. But I am greatly disappointed that Music Hall has not responded to these complaints by outfitting the 2.1 with a classier cartridge. The very least they could do is offer it without the cartridge, but instead I'm stuck paying for this garbage in the final sticker price AND forced to pay for an upgrade.

It's very sad that my much-maligned mass-market DD turntable, purchased for $13 at an estate auction and fitted with a $40 cartridge, could beat the pants off a stock $300 "entry-level hi-fi" turntable. I am, to put it mildly, pissed off. Guess we'll see what happens when I change the cartridge, but for 3 bills (which covers a piece of wood, a motor, a belt, a platter, a piece of crudely hammered metal piping, an anti-skating weight attached to a freakin' fish line and a $.50-in-bulk power switch), I really shouldn't have to make any further investment to at least enjoy what I've purchased.

Similar Products Used:

(primarily) Technics SL-D2 w/Grado Black

Price, simplicity, quality, cartridge (Shure M92E)

Electric motor needs occasional lubrication - and that's not mentioned in the manual.

Great piece of equipment for the price. I know of nothing comparable that's available new. I also (see earlier reviews) had the electric motor freeze up on me after about 14 months of use. Fortunately they still make motors the old-fashioned way in the Czech Republic (no Japanese sealed plastic boxes here...). Scant bit of WD-40 plus 3-in-1 oil to top and bottom shafts of motor and it is back to new. Clearly that needs to be mentioned in the manual.

Similar Products Used:

None

Great sound for the dollar

Cheesy cartridge

Ok, the cartridge aside, this is a very decent turntable for the newbie, just getting into (or back into) analog. Now, even the Elan needs break-in! One reviewer below seems to think it will sound good right out of the box! Not so! Give it some time and the Elan will show what it can do which is essentially give you the midrange correctly and be "nice" but with no delusions of highs or lows extension. Hey, it's a $50 cartridge, you were expecting maybe Benz Glider quality???? Anyway, this thing beats the pants off those crappy direct drives and cheapo Japanese belt drives. No, it isn't as good as more expensive 'tables and it wasn't designed to be. If you want one that has more performance, look no further than the next Music Hall up the line at $500 or a Rega 2 or, if you've got the clams, a VPI or Basis. But don't expect too much from this rig. It is what it is, basically a decent sounding spread that will be plenty for many listeners.

I bought this as a gift for my lil bro who is into all the indie rock that is coming out on vinyl. It sounds brazenly good for the money - after we broke in that cartridge! It fits his electronics which are mass market and bright and cloudy at the same time! He's picking up a Rotel integrated amp which will help the MMF 2.1 shine as well as a pair of those Sound Dynamics RTS-3 speakers. Quite a nice little rig. Ok, buy this thing if you plan on only one turntable OR if you just want to see what all the fuss is about. Even this turntable will show you the music you've been missing from CD which is a vastly inferior format to the lowly LP, which many gave up on in their search for convenience! Buy the turntable! RUN!

Similar Products Used:

Rega, NAD, Rotel and a host of much more expensive stuff

For the price, it's a delightful entry level turntable for people older than 30 years (with lots of old vinyls gathering dust) and for youngsters starting a taste for hi-fi/high-end quest.

Really, really minimal directions booklet, but if you have an archeology degree it's fine I suppose; Included cartridge.

O.k., I fell to the idea that analog sound (you know M. Fremer's sensual explanations: warmer, non-mechanical, with wider scenary than good ol' cd), so I thought it was worth a try and here I go... lots of magazines, catalogues, etc., so I noticed this model rave reviews everywhere and ordered one from A.A. (that's for Audio Advisor, not Alcolic matters...), by the way, since I live in Mexico City, where you just can't get another turntable than dj stuff, the shipping was quite expensive, almost 150.00 bucks, but since it's a really cheap class A turntable... well it's still cheap enough. The installation was not as easy as I expected, since owner's manual is kind of... well... let's say it looks like it was written/drawed by a high-school student, you know: awful ilustrations with unlogical relation with poor written texts... well after 1 hour of logical thinking, there it was, I connected it to my Musical Fidelity's XP-100 pre-amp phono section and played some audiophile rate vinyl... Very good indeed, much more better than I expected, some popping sound, but a nice over-all presentation. Of course, after 2 months I up-graded the cartridge, I replaced the Goldring with a Sumiko's Blue Point and YES!, I really started to understand Fremer's philo... now it sounds wonderful, to put in words it's like your equipment comes to real life, after been sleeping for years. Maybe spending on a $200.00 cartridge to use it on a $300.00 turntable might not be a brilliant idea, but in this case, it's worth to do a non-logical manouvre. Yes, I will up-grade my turntable one of these days, but I think this cheapo lovely thing will stay in my system for some years more.

Similar Products Used:

none, since like 15 years ago...