Review Details

RT82 Reference High Fidelity Vinyl Turntable

Product Rating:

Product Review (submitted on May 18, 2019):

I have been using an LP60 for a little over a year now after gaining an interest in the world of vinyl. I've only had the RT82 for a few days but already I'm impressed with it's features and quality over my last turntable.

The wood finish is pure eye-candy to look at. The plinth is solid and sturdy with a nice weight to it. The speed control knob has a great tactile feel. The 3 acorn shaped feet made it easy to level the plinth. The tonearm is a very nice quality and looks beautiful with the Ortofon Super OM 10 mounted to it. Speaking of the stylus; it produces great sound even on my cheap $100 powered speakers. I may upgrade to an Ortofon RED or BLUE someday, but this one pleases my ears greatly for now. I was afraid a lot of my music may sound washed out or dull since a great deal of my collection consists of technical death metal, yet this cartridge performs nicely even when playing heavy music.

The RPM sensor has to be one of my favorite features of this TT. I almost bought the RT81 but I wanted more consistent speed and less hassle. The RT82 is right on the dot for RPM speed. An app on my phone is saying there is 0.00% wow and flutter; which is probably close to the actual case.

The smokey colored TT dust cover that comes with the RT82 is great, too. The hinges feel of a nice quality and seem to be spring-loaded. One of the hinges were a little bit of a pain to get on to the dust cover but I used a butter knife to help pry it open.

Another thing I love about the RT82 is that it is essentially the same thing as the RT85 minus the Ortofon BLUE and acrylic platter. I'll probably upgrade to those two features if Fluance offers the platter seperately someday. I could talk about this TT for hours as I'm loving it right now.

After many months of research I decided to go with Fluance. This turntable is definitely giving Rega, U-turn and Pro-Ject a run for their money.