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Owner: Joe G.
Analog: Walker Proscenium Gold Turntable, Bluelectric Magic Diamond Cartridge, Walker Precision Motor Drive, Bottlehead modified Technics RS1500 Reel to Reel Tape Deck
Digital: Oppo DVD, Apple MacBook to DigitalPCLink to the Red Wine Audio Monica 2 Battery DAC
Preamp: Supratek Chenin, Bottlehead Seduction Tape Head Preamp
Amp: Wolcott Audio Presence P220 mono blocks
Speakers: Kharma Ceramique 2.2 w/SDSS Stands
Cables: Virtual Dynamics David, Silent Source Signature Power Cables, Silent Source Signature Silver, Signal Cable Signature Interconnects, Synergistic Research Reference 10X Speaker Cables w/active shielding
Stands: DIY Racks made with brass uprights, nuts, washers with threaded Walker Audio Valid Points and Resonance Discs
Tweaks: Walker Audio HDLs on binding posts and Walker Audio Resonance Disc on each speaker, Walker Valid Points 3 cone points, 5 resonance discs (3 under points, 2 on top) for motor controller, VPI 16.5 Record Cleaning Machine
Power: Walker Audio Velocitor Power Conditioner fitted with Valid Points and Resonance Discs, (4) 20Amp dedicated circuits on 10 gauge Romex and 'Porter Port' cryo treated outlets
Room Treatments: by RPG, Quest Audio Interiors, design by Rives Audio.
Room size: 23 x 17 x 10 ft.
Listener: Michael Lavorgna

Exit 2 Re-Do: Joe's New System
My first visit to Joe's place in Cinnaminson, NJ in October 2005 was also my second ever RoadTour. Nearly two years after that visit, I ran into Joe in the Cabasse room at the '07 Stereophile Home Entertainment Show where under the gaze of that giant La Sphere all-seeing eye, Joe mentioned his system had changed. Come June 1st, 2008, I got the official email invite for a re-visit and we coordinated a date; a Monday afternoon in an attempt to avoid spending more time on the NJ Turnpike than I had to. Some drives and roads are scenic. They lend themselves to the tourist's eye and interest. Others are purely utilitarian routes. Thoroughfares cut as straight as possible through less desirable landscapes for the business of efficient transportation, getting there the point, being here an unavoidable reality to be efficiently run through. Welcome to the NJ Turnpike.

When I drive, I enjoy listening to the radio. Mainly music, mostly independent stations like the great WFMU and the more local WPRB. With these stations, you'll hear music you don't know; old and new in all sorts of flavors and sizes. You will never hear the same song on the same day twice unless it's some sort of witticism, some sort of point being made. I find that listening to unfamiliar music can turn even a rather longish drive on an uneventful roadway into something completely enjoyable. On the other hand, repetition can make the same trip feel longer - oh man I've heard Lil Wayne's "Lollipop" five times already. Same driving time, same distance traveled yet a completely different experience. Dougie, a friend from childhood and then some, used to gauge driving time and distance by the number of six packs you could theoretically consume which I always saw as an optimist's point of view. As far as I could tell during my two six-pack drive, nothing much has changed on the NJ Turnpike. I'm not sure whether that is a good or a bad thing.

Walker Audio
Let's start with what's new. Last visit, Lloyd Walker's presence was less... shall we say, profound. There was a Walker Precision Motor Controller, some Valid Points and Resonance Discs. Joe's homebrew rack also follows Lloyd's recipe employing butcher block shelves and brass uprights. The unknowing eye may have easily skipped over these details and hung onto the more obvious elephants in the room. But all that has changed with the introduction of the Walker Proscenium Gold Turntable. Can we even call this a turntable?

Certainly it can't be a record player. A Close 'n' Play is a record player. The Walker is a record playing machine, a music-making contraption of the highest order with massed smashed marble mixed with lead and epoxy resin to form a stealth-like plinth suspended on clouds of air pumped and continuously primed by a series of air compression chambers connected through clear tubing going this way and that, in and around and under the rack, through the floor only to reappear in a different room where they are connected to the mothership of all air-pumping suppliers. The platter is solid lead weighing in at 70 pounds and the whole setup tips the scales at roughly 350 pounds. The integrated linear tracking tonearm (you didn't think Lloyd Walker would leave that door open, did ya?) is composed of carbon fiber and brass and floats on its own air mattress. The tonearm wire is medical-grade ultra-pure, solid-core silver wire with clear .001 inch Teflon insulation. The cartridge is the Walker-recommended Bluelectric Magic Diamond. And if you think I know any of these details because I take really good notes, I'd have fooled you pretty darn good.
No notes, all I did was re-read Mike Malinowksi's excellent and very thorough review of this 'table located right here at 6moons. So I'll stop pretending and just send you over there for the rest of the story.

I also learned from an interview that Srajan conducted with Lloyd Walker way back in December of 2001 that the Walker turntable's first public appearance was at the 1996 Stereophile Home Entertainment show. And on the small world with many intersecting RoadTours theme, Walker Audio shared his setup with a pair of Komuro amplifiers. To complete our Lloyd Walker picture, 6moons' Les Turoczi paid him a visit at his home and manufacturing facility in 2003. Here you'll get to see among other things Lloyd's listening room which includes his personal Proscenium Gold mounted with the Bluelectric Magic Diamond Cartridge and a pair of his then-new Kharma loudspeakers.