Rega Aphelion

I would email Rega they are good guys.  I've heard the RP8 with an expensive Transfiguration cartridge and it was excellent.  

Regards,

Lindsay

I have an RP8 and originally had the Apheta 1 on it but now have an Apheta 2.  The latter is much better than the former in my opinion.  I haven't heard the Aphelion but I have heard consistently good reviews for it and if it is considerably better than the Apheta 2 it should sound superb.  Worth finding a dealer who will let you have a listen with your system

An aphelion costs the same as an RP10 without a cartridge, well here it does anyway. If you trade your 8 against a 10 with an apheta 2 you're going to be close to the price of the aphelion and well set the next time you need a new cartridge.

yeti42 posted:

An aphelion costs the same as an RP10 without a cartridge, well here it does anyway. If you trade your 8 against a 10 with an apheta 2 you're going to be close to the price of the aphelion and well set the next time you need a new cartridge.

YETI, that is not a bad idea. I would still like to hear from anyone with an Aphelion on a RP8 though. When I bought the 8, I decided to get the top of the range for a change. I had no idea the 10 was coming soon and had I know, I would have waited.

Dave

The Strat (Fender) posted:

I would email Rega they are good guys.  I've heard the RP8 with an expensive Transfiguration cartridge and it was excellent.  

Regards,

Lindsay

Possibly a silly question but how do you email Rega?  I recall having a question in the past but the only contact info they had on their site that I could find was to contact your local seller/distributor?

Daren,

yeah just looked at their website see what you mean.  My experience is through talking to them at shows.  

Regards,

Lindsay

Dave

Aphelion benefits mostly from the light-weight arm RB2000. It's significanlty lighter than Apheta.
So I think it's probably better to go for the option Yeti42 was suggesting, provided of course there is someone out there willing to take the RP8 off your hands.

As to whether it's worth it? As I wrote in my previous post Aphelion transformed my RP10 from a rythym machine to a beautifuly  sounding and sublime deck.

Cheers,

Adam

The Strat (Fender) posted:

Daren,

yeah just looked at their website see what you mean.  My experience is through talking to them at shows.  

Regards,

Lindsay

They hide very well.... a complete oposite of Naim.
I was trying to get some guidince on settings for Aphelion - impossible to find it and impossible to contact Rega either. Ah well...

Bodger posted:

yeti42 posted:

An aphelion costs the same as an RP10 without a cartridge, well here it does anyway. If you trade your 8 against a 10 with an apheta 2 you're going to be close to the price of the aphelion and well set the next time you need a new cartridge.

YETI, that is not a bad idea. I would still like to hear from anyone with an Aphelion on a RP8 though. When I bought the 8, I decided to get the top of the range for a change. I had no idea the 10 was coming soon and had I know, I would have waited.

Dave

 

Shortly after release of RP 10, Rega introduced new Planar range starting with Planar 3 followed by 2 and 1

Again shortly after this, a Rega guy mentioned somewhere the RP range was/is dead

My conclusion is we might soon find the ultimate successor to Planar 9, maybe they will call it Planar 9, 12 or whatever ?

BTW a guy over on Pink Fish owned both rp8 & 10 ended up preferring the 8, can't remember what cartridge but maybe worthwhile reading.

Adam Zielinski posted:

The Strat (Fender) posted:

Daren,

yeah just looked at their website see what you mean.  My experience is through talking to them at shows.  

Regards,

Lindsay

They hide very well.... a complete oposite of Naim.
I was trying to get some guidince on settings for Aphelion - impossible to find it and impossible to contact Rega either. Ah well...

Adam,

I guess they trust their dealer network taking care of such matters

Maybe thats why they have very good products spread on entire range, budget to highend and prices accordingly, concentrating on manufacture business only, not running any forum, help desk, further expenses etc.

 

Shortly after release of RP 10, Rega introduced new Planar range starting with Planar 3 followed by 2 and 1

Again shortly after this, a Rega guy mentioned somewhere the RP range was/is dead

My conclusion is we might soon find the ultimate successor to Planar 9, maybe they will call it Planar 9, 12 or whatever ?

BTW a guy over on Pink Fish owned both rp8 & 10 ended up preferring the 8, can't remember what cartridge but maybe worthwhile reading.

Thanks all. When I bought the RP8 I had no idea the 10 was imminent. I did want to buy in to the top model. The other obvious option is to buy the RP10 compete with Aphelion and trade in the 8. Given my previous, this would mean that the RP12 was due out, or according to the quote here, the Planar12 would be launched. If the RP10/Aphelion is that good then this would not be such a bad outcome. It would just leave that pesky upgrade itch which can be hard to ignore.

I did have a search through the Pink Fish site but was looking for my query specifically. I will have another trawl and see what I can uncover.

Dave

Some folks locally did a test and the RP10 with Apheta 1 clearly beat a RP8 with Apheta 2. It's down to the tone arm.

The RP 10 with Aphelion is really, really good.

Hi Dave,

A few things: it took Rega years to develop the RP10 (and the Planar 9/P9 was the "top dog" for ages), which leads me to believe that they wouldn't move on so quickly. I've been wrong before ("Trump has no chance", says he) -- but I doubt it in this case. 

Paul Darwin of Rega is active on Pinkfish and you can message him directly from there.

As to your original question -- there are few absolutes in this hobby, but one of them is to upgrade the deck before you upgrade the cartridge, unless you've done the demos and are satisfied that an "unusual" combination really works.

--Joe

joe9407 posted:

Hi Dave,

A few things: it took Rega years to develop the RP10 (and the Planar 9/P9 was the "top dog" for ages), which leads me to believe that they wouldn't move on so quickly. I've been wrong before ("Trump has no chance", says he) -- but I doubt it in this case. 

Paul Darwin of Rega is active on Pinkfish and you can message him directly from there.

As to your original question -- there are few absolutes in this hobby, but one of them is to upgrade the deck before you upgrade the cartridge, unless you've done the demos and are satisfied that an "unusual" combination really works.

--Joe

Hey Joe, I hope you are right. I bought the RP8 as a break with my normal policy of "one below the top" so I could enjoy the top of the range product for once. Then not long after, the RP10 came out. As it does take some time to develop the next best thing, I think going the RP10 route is probably my best bet. As the RB2000 arm is pretty new this may well find its way onto the next incarnation anyway. This arm seems to be in large part the key to the quality of the deck and an arm that can make best use of high end MC's. I will do as you suggest and try to get hold of Paul D on Pinkfish. I doubt he will be able to confirm or deny any rumors though. 

I have actually found a Rega dealer here in Athens. I shall get hold of them after the holidays and see what they have. Due to the ongoing crisis in Greece, most shops of any description tend not to carry much stock these days. This extends even to wine cellars these days! Worth a try though. Home trials are also a bit of an alien concept here. That's for Hifi, not wine.

I am getting quite mixed replay from the RP8 but some of this may be down to the Apheta1 which has previous in being a bit up and down. I also need to do some experiments in stacking order on the brawn stack as the supercap is currently in between the 500 and 552 PS. Any gains here are pretty cheap. I'm not really a serial upgrader so getting to a top deck with a suitable MC and sitting back is my main objective. Even if the next P12 made the RP10 sound broken, I reckon I could cope with that.

Apart from trying the local Rega dealer, this project is medium term. My next job will be to DR the NAP as this will boost all inputs and show what the amp can really do. Who knows, after this, the RP10 itch may fade away. In the meantime it is comfy chair, music and cleaning vinyl. Merry Christmas to all.

Dave

Dave

If RP12 ever comes out it would have to be a hell of a machine to make RP10 / Aphelion sound 'broken'

So far RP10/Aphelion has bettered my LP12 with Radikal / Urika (ok - I still have an arm and a sub-chassis to upgrade). So it is one competent turntable.

Mery Christmas,

Adam