Analog Gear News

SME debuted a new "Flagship" turntable at an event held March 25th, 2022 at the company's Steyning, West Sussex U.K. headquarters and in the legendary listening room of the company's founder, the late Alastair Robertson-Aikman. When I asked CEO Stuart McNeilis if yet another factory tour was necessary, he said "you be the judge". The answer was "yes" as new owner Ajay Shirke has made considerable investments in SME including new CNC machines, a brand new state of the art plating facility and a new tolerance measuring system that produces even greater machining tolerances than the already legendary SME precision.

The event was held mainly for worldwide distributors with but a few journalists on hand. I was lucky to be one of them.

The new Model 60 combines all-new thinking and engineering with what was best about the former "flagship" Model 30, including a new internally mounted "O-ring" suspension system that isolates both vertically as before and now horizontally as well. There's a new A.C. motor and motor control system in place of the 30's D.C. motor and now the transformer is externally mounted in its own chassis so it can be further isolated form the signal path and motor control placement is no longer critical in that regard.

The new Model VA arm is machined from a 'space age' polymer in place of the V's magnesium tube arm and the termination is now in chassis-mounted RCA jacks instead of the traditional DIN plug. There's much more to see in the exclusive video.The elegant simplicity can fool you into thinking this is a simple design, but that's hardly the case.

Based on what I heard in the listening room the new Model 60 combines the 30's "gravity" with the Model 15's liveliness and excitement. I cannot wait to get one in for review. Don't hold me to it but the price is said to be around $50,000 with the new VA arm, which to me indicates "aggressive pricing".