DirectDrive Geschichte

History of Direct Drive starts in 1929 when Thorens took a patent for a grammophone with direct-driven platter. But 40 years had to pass until finally turntables with Direct-Drive made their way to recording-studios, radio-stations and homes of music lovers all over the world. The history of Direct-Drive turntables really starts with the introduction of the National/Technics SP-10 in 1969.

The Beginnings

The beginnings of the Direct-Drive era are connected with the brand National/Technics and their efforts to build a professional transcription turntable for broadcast users.
At the end of the 60s almost every radio-station in the world used an EMT deck. The EMT 930 was the ideal transcription turntable capable of fast startup and rock steady turning the platter. This was achieved by using an idler drive rigidly coupled to a very heavy inner platter. By coupling a light outer-platter to the already turning inner platter a very fast start-up was possible.
The drawbacks of those decks were the countless moving parts and bearings which all added resonances and all had to be regularily serviced to guarantee the 24hrs a day performance needed in professional broadcast centers. To optimize tracking records the engineers at Technics soo realized that this could only be achieved by reducing the numbers of moveable parts in a turntable. This meant also reducing the number of parts to service and it also meant that the deck would cost less as all those parts at the end of the 60s were getting quite expensive. Obviously engineers in Europe at that time had the same ideas as in 1968 Thorens/Germany introduced their belt-driven TD-125. Unlike its predecessor the famous TD-124 with combined belt-/idler-drive the TD-125 was a much simpler machine with only 3/4 of the parts of the 124. The TD-125 was one of the first decks to incorporate an electronic regualtion for the motor to achieve maximal steady turning of the platter. For professionals however the belt-drive was of no use cause the startup time was way too high with the rubber-belt slipping at the motor-pulley.
The japanese had more radical ideas. As strong, slow turning DC-Motors were already available and electronic regualtions getting cheaper almost every day they saw new possibilities: If the motor shaft would be identical to the platter-spindle ther would be only ONE moving part in the whole system which turns very slowly and had a high mass (the platter) coupled to it - mechanically this solution seemed almost ideal.
The problem was that no motor runs completely smooth (a motor tends to "jump" from pole to pole) so the motor-turning had to be controlled electronically. An electronic reference-signal was compared to a tachometer-signal of the underside of the platter and the difference-signal was used to regulate the motor. That way the Technics engineers achieved very steady and smooth turning of the SP-10's heavy platter. This regualtion together with quite a strong motor allowed a very fast startup-time, too.
The Direct-Drive turntable was born. Introduced in 1969 the National/technics SP-10 was an immediate success. Radio-stations all over the world used an SP-10 and only a few months later other japanese audio-companies like Nippon/Columbia (Denon), Victor (JVC) and Sony presented Direct-Drive turntables of their own.

Direct-Drive At Home

But the japanese companies thought further. At the end of the 60s the domestic-audio market all over the world began to explode. More and more music-lovers bought audio-systems and a market evolved where big money was to be made. Companies like Dual, Thorens or Garrard then were the traditional big names in turntables. By reducing the number of (then already) expensive mechanical parts the japanese were able to offer equal sounding and looking decks which costed considerably less to produce (and to transport!) at reasonable prices. Among the first was obviously National/Technics with their SL-110. During the 70s the domestic audio market was flooded by Direct-Drive japanese made decks causing big trouble for the then established european companies

Make A Good Thing Better

The first motor-regualtions developed by Technics or Sony weren't bad - but they had their problems: By reading the minute fluctuations from the platter by a tachometer the motor-turning a fluctuation had to occur before the motor-turning was corrected. The first generation of Direct-Drive players had also some problems in genrating a clean reference-signal for the regulation.
In germany EMT had to react on the introduction of the SP-10 and EMT did it in the usual "no compromise" manner. 1974 the "Plattenabspielmaschine 950" was introduced at a price of around 4000,- Dollars. EMT had built the ultimate transcription turntable - built like a tank, with new features like backwards spinning and very good ergonomics EMT managed to get back lost parts of the professional market. The 950 and its little brother the 948 soon were used in broadcast-studios all over the world.
EMT incorporated a new motor-regulation by taking a Hall-generator's signal as reference and thereby achieving a very clean reference almost independent of mains-disturbances, temperature or other outer influences. The EMT regualtion was so good that they put just a tiny 200g. platter on the table, reaching a start-up time of just 0.2 seconds. Nippon/Columbia, known in the professional world under the brand name Denon set their DP-series against the EMTs and SP10s. With their DP-5000 the difference-signal was read by a tape-head from a magnetic ring under the platter. The FG-servo-controlled motor-regulation was thus feeded with a correcting-signal BEFORE any significant fluctuation of speed had even happened.
Other japanese companies introduced the PLL-principle. By putting the reference-generator and the tachometer in a phase-locked-loop, the turning of the motor was corrected when only a slight phase-difference between the reference-signal and the platter-position occured. This left just a very slight and more important almost constant phase-difference between both signals. The turning of the platter now just depended entirely on a clean reference-signal and in the mid70s the japanese began to incoroporate quarz-generators as the most precise devices in their decks.
All these 2nd generation decks are sonically much better then their fathers with some top-decks of that time achieving a performance which even by nowadays standards may satisfy a critical audiophile.

The Heydays And The End

At the end of the 70s the japanese audio-industry was in a unique position. They had gained control over the worldwide audio-market, the Yen was cheap and big numbers of well-educated engineers brought one innovation after the other out of their laboratories. The "golden age" of audio had risen - those were exciting times with many new models being developed and announced in regular intervals. At the end of the 70s there really was a sort of race between the mayor-players introducing ever bigger, better and more sophisticated turntables sometimes at very high prices. To understand this you have to know that the Compact-Disc at that time was close before introducing, almost every audiophile had a turntable already so the mid-class market was set. Apart from these reasons the analog flagships of that time were image- and prestige-products of the japanese companies often subzidized by their mass-market brothers.
Machines like the Sony PS-X9, the Trio/Kenwood L07D, the Technics SP-10MkII or the Denon DP-100 were built in a "cost-no-object" attitude that never again arises out of Japan. The best materials, excellent Build-quality, oversizing of all parts and innovative ideas were the characteristical ingredients of the top-decks at that time.
Those machines marked the end of an evolutionary process with non-measurable Wow & Flutter or noise-specifications and they had a sonic quality that even by nowadays standards is state-of-the-art. But 1982 the CD finally arrived and it was the beginning of the end for those machines. All japanese companies concentrated their engineering efforts towards "digital". Production-costs had risen and the Yen was standing higher making export of audio-gear more expensive. This was the time when the cost-cutters arrived and soon dominated the engineers. The analog-battleships developed in the late 70s and early 80s were the first products that were killed by this new ideology. Like Dinosaurs they had become bigger and bigger and now they're end had come.
At the end of the 80s there was only Technics left with their famous SP-10 serving the professional market. EMT was bought by Barco and Denon quit production of their professional decks.
The decks for domestic market were just cheap plastic-cages with a motor in it and companies like Luxman or Micro Seiki were forced to switch to belt-driven turntables as there was soon no parts- supplier for high quality Direct-Drives in Japan any more
At that time only Nakamichi produced some top Direct-Drives. The Goldmund decks brought a short renaissance of the Direct-Drive among audiophiles but for most of us their prices were way too high.

Renaissance In The 90s

With the invention of new music-styles like Rap, Direct Drives became popular again. Now they served as a kind of "musical-instrument" for creative DJ's with the Technics SL-1210Mk2 becoming a sort of stndard-table in the clubs. Techniques like spinning or scratching needed decks with strong, durable motors and fast regulations of speed. You should never try to scratch on a Linn LP12 turntable... Technics soo presented a new SL-1210 which never was as good as the original just like the countless 1210-clones from Omnitronics, Vestax, etc.
In domestic high-end audio the Direct-Drive at that time apart from the Goldmund decks was simply dead. The renaissance of direct-drive decks at home began when audiomaniacs started to buy these decks from radio-stations and privates who switched to CD discovering the sonic excellence of some of these decks when combined with a decent plint and a modern arm.
Another big group rediscovering direct-drive decks were the then "forty-something" age group. These people were young when these decks were new and many of them harbored dreams of owning one since their youth. These were the machines they couldn't afford then, but at the end of the 90s they were ready and able to plunk down the original retail-price for a Micro DQX-1000. Easily available through the Internet lots of Denons, Technics and others made their way to their new homes.

DirectDrive Today

The days whe you could buy a Denon DP-2000 for 100,- bucks are dfinitely gone. Most radio- stations have stored their whole analog-archive on CD's or computers and had long sold their last turntables. During the big throw-out-wave in the 90s it wasn't unusual to find an EMT 948 deck for around 500,- bucks with Technics SP10s were sold at almost every corner for 200 bucks or so.
Nowadays the prices are rising. For many good decks you must expect to pay as much as the prics when new. EMTs can be seen as sort of an alternative to stock options as they are highly sought after by audiomaniacs in Japan (an irony itself). The number of decks around is decreasing as many of these suffered from blown electrics or ended on the junk-yard. Top models from the 70s command high prices among audiophiles simply for nostalgic reasons (see above).
Good transcription turntables like the SP10s or the big Denons offered without a plinth are still a reasonable deal at around 400-500 bucks as many audiophiles seem to shy away the work of builing an own plinth for these decks. Right now the SP10Mk2 seems to be the audio-bargain of all times when it comes to set up a top analog-frontend.
The big prestige-decks like the Nakamichis or the Goldmunds won't get cheaper, too. Many audiophiles recognized that today there isn't anything quite equal to these decks. But if you really spend some time in the end you surely will find your dream. They are still around us - those wonderful DirectDrives.