If I was looking for a cabinet machine with a full size horn (i.e. not one which is effectively a table model with record storage beneath) I would not restrict my search to HMV when there are good alternatives which can be bought for a fraction of the price. Pictured below are :bulleid_pacific wrote:I have recently joined the CLPGS too. I was very happy with my 109 (and have a 5b soundbox which fits it, although I usually use the No 4 it came with) and still am but there's no doubt the 104 and especially the 130 are better. The 109, in turn, is better than the 110 and 125 I have, both of which have a No 2 soundbox and are completely out of their depth with electrical recordings. There is definitely an evolutionary improvement over time. I'm now after a 157 (or better still, a 'proper' re-entrant 163). I may not get financial planning permission for the latter!Herewith, for comparison, is the horn of a Model 109: longer overall and (unlike that of the 130) laterally symmetrical at the mouth, but obviously more convoluted and I think shallower, since it has to pass under the motor rather than round it.
I now run this machine with a 5B sound-box, which cost half as much as the gramophone itself but has proved a thoroughly worthwhile investment. The original No. 4 (a good example of its kind) still had some of the penetrating quality of the old Exhibition, giving the impression (I know I am speaking unscientifically) that the sound-waves were being forcibly projected out of the horn instead of propagating naturally – a quality which has its own kind of excitement, especially when applied to the higher brass or to a strong voice, but which is nonetheless fundamentally artificial. By contrast, the 5B allows me to forget that I am listening to an acoustic reproducer, so that I can feel there is nothing between me and the record; and this is something I have not experienced for half a lifetime. How nearly this approaches the standards of the Model 130 is of course more than I can say (likewise, I have never directly heard an EMG or any of the big post-1929 internal-horn machines), but I think it will serve for the rest of my life.
1) My Salon Decca Model 72, reluctantly sold to make room for......
2) My Micro-Perophone Chromogram Model 23a which I still own and which was my every day player until I bought my Expert Minor.
3) A friend's Plano-Reflex Columbia Model 133a.