There Seems to Be a Swamp in the Record Player

I am sure many of you from the countryside can relate to this, but old houses in the countryside often have a lot of things stored in rooms that have become unopened rooms.
My parents' house is such a house with a lot of stuff and there is a room that looks like a time slip beyond the Reiwa Era back to the Showa and Heisei eras. The room is overflowing with things that have become relics that will never be used.

When I returned home the other day, I happened to take a peek into that room when I was packing up my belongings.
I saw an object shaped like a wooden box in the back of the room, so I was curious and took it out...

It was a record player.
I thought it had been used by my parents long ago and it had been thrown away.

It’s a YAMAHA, a DENON, and a panda record player.
There is a mystery as to why the YAMAHA sticker was put on it, and why there’s a panda, but the faded look strangely made me melancholy.

I couldn't check if it still worked, but I decided to take it. It would be interesting to try to fix it if it was broken.
There are some records I would like to listen to in analog form, and above all, I was happy to feel that I had found a treasure.

I turned the power on and the rotation and speed adjustment looked fine, but I couldn’t check the needle because there was no record. I decided to do it later.

DENON DP-1000 Turntable
I looked up the background on this player and found that it was made in 1974, which was about half a century ago. It was called “deh-NON” and not “DENnun” at that time. I can't wait to try the sound.

Here is something you should not forget to prepare before the record arrives.
The output from a record player is weak, so when I connect it directly to an amplifier or mixer, it will not produce accurate sound.
To correct the frequency here, I inserted a device called a phono equalizer between the record player and the input device.
(Incidentally, many record players nowadays have a LINE OUT output or a PHONO IN jack on the input device, so there is no need to connect a new phono equalizer. If you are interested, please refer to this article)

→ [Part 1] “What is a Phono Equalizer?” An Explanation and Popularity Ranking for DJs & Audio Beginners

I had a hard time deciding on which one to choose, but I chose this one because of its price and appearance.

audio technica / AT-PEQ3 Phono equalizer

I connected the ground properly, and it works well.

MACKIE / MIX5 Compact Analog Mixer

I bought a mixer because I have more devices to input.

The record arrived and when I played it, I was able to confirm that the needle was fine and that the output was safe. I was a little disappointed because I thought there would be some defects because it was old and I was willing to fix it. Nope, perhaps DENON's quality is just that high. It’s amazing that it still works properly even after half a century.
The phono equalizer is also nice and doesn’t show any quirks.

By chance, I found this record player and I've definitely fallen into the swamp that is this analog record player.
It’s nice that people are able to listen to music as much as they want with a subscription, but it’s also nice to listen to music with the weight of each song on an analog record.
I would like to enjoy this player in the future after performing some maintenance on it and changing out the needles.