VPI Aries Scout

High value in a great sounding turntable

By Michael Jones

January 2004

VPI Aries Scout turntable and JMW-9 tonearm. $3895

I've always found it ironic that resonance and vibration - the very things that create sound - are also the enemy of hi-fi. Vibrations have a harmful effect in many places in the hi-fi chain, but none more so than with turntables.

Take a vinyl record playing on a turntable. The stylus reading the grooves creates vibrations within the vinyl, which go where? The cartridge in any tonearm has various resonances, as does the tonearm itself.

The bearing of the platter is another great source for vibrations, as is the motor required to drive the platter. Sound is vibrations in the air, and those vibrations affect both the turntable and what the turntable is sitting on.

Despite all this, it is possible to get very good sound from records at low prices, as any Rega or AR turntable owner will tell you. But to hear superlative sound from vinyl, the consideration mentioned above must be addressed. Here's how VPI achieved superlative sound from their $3895 Aries Scout and JMW-9 package.

A 35mm acrylic platter is used. As acrylic has similar properties to vinyl records, this helps absorb and dissipate the vibrations set up by a cartridge transversing the groove. A clamping arrangement, consisting of a rubber washer that sites under the LP and a screw-on clamp, ensures that the record lies flat.

The platter itself sits on an inverted bearing of Teflon and brass on a 60 case hardened rod. The motor is completely separate from the turntable plinth, connecting only via a belt.

The Aries Scout does not have a suspended subchassis, as found in AR, Linn and Thorens turntables. The plinth is 30mm MDF, bonded to a 12 gauge steel plate, presumably as a vibration sink. Four large cones sit at each corner as feet. These are threaded, which makes it very easy to level the turntable - why don't other turntable manufacturers do this?

Every turntable needs a tonearm and, in New Zealand at least, the Aries Scout comes complete with the VPI JMW-9 tonearm. The JMW-9 is a unipivot tonearm - twenty years ago you couldn't give away a unipivot, now they're all the rage.

The JMW-9 is very adjustable, with vertical tracking angle easy to set up. The tonearm can easily be removed and replaced in seconds, should you want to use a number of cartridges. I had fun watching the faces of visitors as I simply picked up the tonearm from its bearing.

The VPI combo was used with both the Grado Prestige Gold and Audio Technica OC9 cartridges, the phono stage built into the Plinius 8150 and the standalone Plinius Jarrah phono stage, and my Epos ES14 and the Mirage Omni-250 loudspeakers.

This is a magnificent turntable, which will please the ears, hearts and wallets of vinyl junkies. The amount of clean, clear, non-fatiguing sound coming from the VPI could even make anti-analog digital bigots pay attention.

Overall, the VPI Scout has a stable, neutral and dynamic sound. Music can easily burst forth from the speakers in a way that CD struggles to do, with an unforced sense of dynamics.

Bass can be a problem with turntables, often becoming soggy and bloated, particularly with many suspended subchassis turntables (it's those resonances again). In contrast, the bass via the VPI is deep and powerful, with a great sense of pitch and timing.

Some people obsess over record noise. A good turntable, arm and cartridge will make your records seem quieter, less prone to the common vinyl woes of clicks and pops.

How so? Turntables that replay records as noisy (often nasty plastic turntables) usually have various resonance problems of their own. Play the same record on a Well Tempered or VPI and the noise goes down considerably. As a bonus, record noise will usually seem disconnected from the music, allowing a listener to focus on the music, not the noise.

The VPI is free from imposing its own sound on the music, so that a cartridge's sound can be revealed. For example, the Grado was so dynamic and lively, with the OC9 was less obviously dynamic, but more refined in its presentation of what was in the grooves.

I see the Aries Scout/JMW combination as an obvious step-up for owners of a Rega 3 or AR turntable wishing to get more from their records. I think that it would also shock many Linn LP12 owners, particularly those with older decks.

This is an excellent turntable and tonearm combination, bringing the price of a great vinyl front end down into a relatively affordable area. Highly recommended.