Floating sub-chassis
The A2 employs a sub-chassis construction, where the tonearm, platter bearing and motor are mounted onto a separate floating sub-chassis. This isolates all the most critical turntable elements further and adds an extra layer of protection against outside noise, resonances and interference. This has especially big advantages, when your loudspeakers are very close to the turntable.
Pro-Ject Design Philosophy
Adding Pro-Ject designs and ideas, we have spent a lot of time on the A2‘s clean design language. You will see similarities to iconic designs of the German audio industry. Today, we believe that this minimalistic approach is very much modern again.
Improved automatic mechanism
We have invested in a new aluminium diecast top for the whole sub-chassis and automatic mechanism. We have tried to avoid plastic parts from the original German automatic design as much as possible. This is the first time in all the 50 years of its existence that the original automatic design has received an improvement like this. Due to the new aluminium diecast cover and the massive chassis, the whole sub-chassis construction is more effective and isolates unwanted resonance much better.
Massless tracking force adjustment
The A2 uses a new system for setting the tracking force. As usual, you first level out the tonearm with the damped counterweight. Damping the counter- weight makes the tonearm as a whole more robust and decouples the counterweight from the tonearm reducing resonant frequencies. Afterwards the tracking force is set by turning a dial directly on the tonearm bearing. Not only is this system very fast, precise and efficient, it also keeps the center of gravity directly on top of the bearing center. The spring based anti-skating can also be adjusted directly on the tonearm base.
Improved tonearm & cardanic bearing
The A2 features an 8.3” ultra-light-mass aluminium tonearm with an improved tonearm tube with bigger diameter. The is a perfect match for the slightly heavier Ortofon 2M Red. In combination we retain the super fast response and all transient detail with lots of fine microdynamics, while the new 2M Red adds a lot of body and musical warmth. The tonearm bearing has received a major upgrade, is now made out of aluminium and features a 4-pin-point cardanic construction with steel tip ball bearings from our own production. This allows for unhindered and free tonearm movement with the lowest amount of friction possible. The A2 will track your vinyl records with the utmost of precision and tightness.
Why Ultra-Light-Mass tonearm?
Since forever, there has been this technical discussion about light-weight tonearms with high compliance MM cartridges vs. heavy tonearms with low compliance MC cartridges. Both approaches have advantages and disadvantages and you‘ll find detailed analysis in concerned literature. However, when it comes to automatic turntables, we NEED ultra-light-mass tonearms. There is no way around it. We need the automatic mechanics to be like those in mechanical watches: small and precise. A heavy tonearm would result in a rougher mechanical design as much higher masses have to be moved. Therefore, the A2 reaches performance hights like no other automatic turntable on the market.
