Review: Audio-Technica LP2D USB turntable

Anyone over a certain age probably has somewhere, in a basement corner or the back of an attic, a couple of boxes of old LPs—those large plastic discs with grooves people used to play music on. CD replaced records and tapes, and digital files have largely replaced. This creates a problem for people who spent years collecting records they no longer can play. You could repurchase all that music from iTunes or Amazon or eMusic, or you could use this Audio-Technica LP2D USB turntable to rip your records.

The AT USB turntable is a thin, lightweight turntable that does everything you remember a turntable should do. You can switch between 7-inch and 12-inch disc sizes and 45rpm and 33rpm speeds. There’s an adapter insert for 7-inch 45s. It includes a dual magnet phono cartridge with replaceable diamond stylus. The aluminum disc platter comes with a rubber mat, and there’s a clear dust cover. If you don’t have a phono input on your audio receiver (few do these days), the turntable’s got a fix for that too as there’s an internal phono pre-amp and a switch in the back for selecting line-level or phono output. And of course there’s the USB port (cable included).

Setting the turntable up was kind of fun as I hadn’t done that in a long time. First I had to install the drive belt, then place the disc platter in place and snap in the stylus cartridge. Then I had to find my records.

On the computer side, the AT comes with two recording applications: Cakewalk’s Pyro 5 for PC and Audacity for PC or MAC. I opted for the Pyro. Installation of Pyro requires registration and an e-mail address just to get the program to open up. There’s a separate registration for encoding MP3 files, a process I found simple, but annoying. There are also a few steps to go through to make sure your PC’s soundcard properly recognizes the signal from the turntable, but thankfully the printed software guide walks you through it step-by-step with color illustrations.

To record a record, place it on the turntable, open up the application on the PC and select the option to Make CD of Your Cassettes or LPs. You then need to name your file, press the Start button on the turntable and click Start Recording in Pyro. Pyro then records a WAV file of that side of the disc. When it’s over, stop the recording and save the file as a Pyro project, flip the record and start again. In the end you get three files. One WAV for each side of the album and one Pyro project file which you can edit into separate tracks, run filters to reduce noise, adjust other effects or convert it into MP3 or WMA formats (at various bit rate options). You can also burn the WAV files straight to a CD.