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Mobile Fidelity - Santana, Abraxas UD1S 2-001


Sk1Bum

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Wow!

 

I've got quite a MFSL vinyl discs, but none of the ultra discs, because I just didn't see why they would be any better simply because they're 120 g heavier.  Lol 

 

Also have a bunch of Sheffield Lab discs, and Nautilus Superdiscs. 

 

Telarc made some great classical recordings as audiophile discs as well. Including one of the most famous records ever... Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture. You can actually visibly see the 6Hz cannon shot grooves with your naked eye. Only one cartridge that I know of was ever able to track that groove, and that was the Shure V15 type V.

 

Now, if I could only find an exact replacement for that cartridge... Sigh

 

 

 

 

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2 hours ago, davidc said:

I've got quite a MFSL vinyl discs, but none of the ultra discs, because I just didn't see why they would be any better simply because they're 120 g heavier.  Lol 

 

 

There is a bit more than weight involved with the UD1S albums. Mobile Fidelity has a 1 step process of pressing the discs instead of 3 steps. They're now using a proprietary SuperVinyl, and all of the UD1S albums are 45 rpm discs.

 

You can read more about the process here...

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Hi David

Thanks for the fine memories. My experience exactly - visual observation of the grooves in the track, and ownership of the Shure V15 as well.

Sounded great on my C4000 and M400 and big VMPS tower (with 2 x 12" active woofers and 15" passive bottom slot firing sub-sub) back in 1982.

Quite impressive in a small student condo. LOL. But the canons are short bursts right?

 

 

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2 hours ago, davidc said:

Interesting. Is this the same way they did it 30-40 yrs ago when they first introduced it?

 

I'm not sure what "it" refers to, but the one step process is fairly new. It was introduced with Santana Abraxas UD1S 2-001, and I believe it was 2016. Their SuperVinyl is also relatively new, but they're also using it on some other albums. Two that I know of are Bob Dylan Desire, and Elvis Costello & Burt Bacharach Painted From Memory.  The Bob Dylan album was a limited release of 2000 at $75, now out of print and being listed on ebay in the $300 neighborhood. The Costello & Bacharach album is also sold out. The last one of those I saw on ebay was $150. It was limited to 2000 copies and originally priced at $50.

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55 minutes ago, Sk1Bum said:

Another copy of Santana Abraxas UD1s 2-001 just sold for $1899.  Same seller as the first post in this thread.

 

https://www.ebay.com/itm/124707053849

Sorry, I wasn't real clear in my questions/comment.. Mobile Fidelity Sound Labs first produced their audiophile Original Master  Recordings, OMR, in the 70s. Then in the early 80s they came out with their UHQR, Ultra High Quality Recordings, which were on heavier vinyl, and used JVCs proprietary Supervinyl. I was wondering if that super vinyl is the same as today's super vinyl. They also changed some of the mastering and pressing techniques to make the discs better as well. They were about double the cost of their regular O My R discs. So I didn't know if they were really worth the price back then. I quickly tried to look up exactly what was different in the uhqr disks, but wasn't able to find anything specific. There is a little bit of info on the new Mofi website, and Wikipedia

 

 

In 1977 Mobile Fidelity began to produce a line of records known as "Original Master Recording" vinyl LPs. These albums were previously released by other companies, licensed by Mobile Fidelity, and remastered by a process called half-speed mastering. During mastering, sound was transferred from magnetic tape to disc while the cutting lathe moved at half speed. The albums were remastered from the original analog master tapes, without compression, and with minimal equalization. The recordings were pressed in Japan on "Supervinyl", a plastic compound invented by JVC to compensate for the demands of quadraphonic Compatible Discrete 4 records, which had been introduced in 1972. JVC Supervinyl was more durable than regular vinyl, with lower surface noise and fewer pops and clicks. Mobile Fidelity packaged their albums in heavy cardboard sleeves, inner cardboard stiffeners, and plastic liners

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I have one of the UHQR albums, Earl Klugh, Finger Paintings. There were 8 different UHQR albums of them made, and if you can get a sealed copy of Dark Side of the Moon or Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band for under $2K, you should buy it. I bought the open copy that I have for under $100, and it's worth about $150. I play it occasionally. It sounds great, but the UD1S albums that I've opened sound better. Some of them, remarkably so. The best sounding ones that I have are, Yes-Fragile, Donald Fagen-The Nightfly, and Marvin Gaye-What's Going On. The only one that I'm a bit disappointed in is Simon & Garfunkel-Bridge Over Troubled Water, but I'm not a Simon & Garfunkel fan anyway.

 

The one step stamping process was first introduced with UD1S 2-0001. My UHQR album sleeve mentions the JVC Super Vinyl, and I don't know if that is the same as the UD1S (and others) SuperVinyl. I would hope that given the cost and 40 years that SuperVinyl is at the least an improvement on Super Vinyl. 

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22 minutes ago, Sk1Bum said:

I have one of the UHQR albums, Earl Klugh, Finger Paintings. There were 8 different UHQR albums of them made, and if you can get a sealed copy of Dark Side of the Moon or Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band for under $2K, you should buy it. I bought the open copy that I have for under $100, and it's worth about $150. I play it occasionally. It sounds great, but the UD1S albums that I've opened sound better. Some of them, remarkably so. The best sounding ones that I have are, Yes-Fragile, Donald Fagen-The Nightfly, and Marvin Gaye-What's Going On. The only one that I'm a bit disappointed in is Simon & Garfunkel-Bridge Over Troubled Water, but I'm not a Simon & Garfunkel fan anyway.

 

The one step stamping process was first introduced with UD1S 2-0001. My UHQR album sleeve mentions the JVC Super Vinyl, and I don't know if that is the same as the UD1S (and others) SuperVinyl. I would hope that given the cost and 40 years that SuperVinyl is at the least an improvement on Super Vinyl. 

Damn, I knew I should have bought some of those discs way back when! I have several sealed copies of dark side of the Moon, one of steely Dan Asia and a couple of others that I don't really remember that are in my garage, but they're all the original omr recordings, not the uhqr ones.

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I have no idea how many of the MOFI regular vinyl I have. Now, every time I buy new MOFI recordings, I buy 2 if MOFI allows it. One to open, and one to rat-hole. 

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