Pro-Ject Audio Systems has earned a solid reputation for creating simple turntables, although audiophile in conception, that allows them to display a superb musicality. The key? Zero artifices and no unnecessary aesthetic dalliances: only good materials and high technology. However, over the years, a growing number of lovers of the veteran Austrian firm’s products began to demand turntables. more decidedly High End with luxurious finishes most spectacular, the result being the Signature range. One of the models that best represents this philosophy was undoubtedly the vinyl player developed to celebrate the 175th anniversary of the legendary Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, the 175 VPOin which original wood and metal from musical instruments were used in order to build a total of 175 units, now converted into authentic collector’s pieces.
Inspired in this sensational product and based on the celebrated The Classic EVO, the new The Classic Reference combines, using the classic belt drivetechnical refinement and luxurious aesthetics like no other achievement in its class. A supreme demonstration of what we have just said is found in the reading arm, an unequivocally High End design brimming with cutting-edge engineering that responds to the name of EVO 9 AS HGin which a inverted gimbal gyro systemof Swiss origin and ABEC 7 grade, and a aluminum tube special “S” shape with high internal damping, completed with a SME capsule holder. The internal wiring is high purity flexible copperan optimal conductor for the low amplitude of phono signals. For its part, the plate is made of a special aluminum alloy with anti-resonance treatment via an internal ring of thermoplastic elastomer (TPE, a material also present in the counterweight and in the subframe suspension), while the structure of the rotation subsystem is very similar to that of the aforementioned 175 VPO.
To this we must add a aluminum sub-platter immaculately machined and a alternating current motor excited by direct current and an elaborate electronic speed control (33m 45 and 78 rpm). Finally, it should be noted that The Classic Reference incorporates a sandwich frame chassis made of aluminum and MDF that is supported by height-adjustable decoupling cones, and, in line with what is expected from a next-generation turntable signed by Pro-Ject, balanced outputs with XLR connectors that complement the traditional unbalanced RCA connectors. Finally, it is worth adding the optional possibility of mounting the exclusive pickup capsule, the VPO Anniversary (manufactured by the Danish Ortofon following strict Pro-Ject specifications), hand-selected and whose exceptional musicality is the result of a tuned set of their sound with members of the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra.
