One of the hottest stories in the last 12 months has been the release of Panasonic’s Technics SL-1200GR, the still too expensive but slightly more affordable version of the off thechart expensive 1200G and 1200GAE. Our stance from the start of this, backed up by Panasonic’s own PR, media statements, and Technics audiophile brand positioning has been that the new turntables have not been made for DJs.
That doesn’t mean that DJs can’t use them of course, but with a marketplace full of viable alternatives and also second hand OG technics, it doesn’t make a huge amount of sense for DJs to drop so much coin on the new ones.
But still, some were convinced that the DJ world had seen saved, and that the Technics SL-1200GR was the second coming — but we didn’t believe that from the start. However, it’s well and good saying it, but it took one of our kind i.e. DJ gear reviewers to roll up his sleeves (wait… he only wears t-shirts, lots and lots of t-shirts) and actually prove it. Thus DJ City’s Mojaxx set about getting a 1200GR in for review, a task that proved to be harder than he imagined.
Following proven official channels into Panasonic, Mojaxx got precisely nowhere quickly. He met a brick wall similar to the one that we hit when we wanted to get the SL-DZ1200 media player in all those years ago, albeit without reps actually running away from us at trade shows. So he shook his grapevine and found a friendly retailer in the shape of Westend DJ who provided Mojaxx with a unit upon which he carried out his usual level of in front of camera magic.
It’s absolutely worth watching the lowdown from Mojaxx. But the basic takeaway is that while the new SL-1200GR is worthy in so many ways, the squidgy feet make the 1200GR unsuitable for DJing because of their audiophile friendly design. And the price really does make them too expensive given the sheer volume of new and used turntables in the market place.
Bar the squidgy feet issue, Mojaxx pretty much confirms what we and everyone else has said all along. So if you have big pockets, you can indeed grab yourself a pair of new 1200GRs (£2600), but also get yourself some original Technics feet (£294 for a set of eight) for them to make them usable for spinning, which does rather defeat the object of spending all that money in the first place. For £3K however, you can get a full high quality DJ turntable/mixer setup.
So big thanks to Mojaxx for taking one for team DJWORX, and to Westend DJ for making it happen.
whats your take on the Stokyo refurbs sold on Turntablelab? My 1994 1200s are on their last legs.
If you’re from Europe, you might wanna check http://djsdreamcustoms.com/
They probably can fix your old Technics.
I wonder how they were released – obviously without someone trying to scratch on them?
Mojaxx is class, i kind of want to find him annoying in an English wannabe Gangsta kind of way but love his reviews and he just comes across as sound.
I sometimes think Mojaxx’s reviews is rush. For example, he did a review of a MasterSounds Radius 4 rotary mixer with no examples on how it sound. The most important part of a video review is to hear some example of what you’re explaining. If I, just want a worded review. I read it from here or dj tech tools website. He goes on a video for 5 or 10 minutes about a product and everyone says that’s a great review. The mixer is sitting between a denon sc5000 and vestax pdx-2300mk2 and Mojaxx talk his way the entire review. No example how the eq or the filter sound or sweep. No example of the warmth on any of the channel has when you send a signal through. He says in Technics SL-1200GR video the feet makes the deck wobbly. Not one example of him back spinning on the deck with the needle on the vinyl, hearing the track skip. Little example like this help and educate further where, reading a article on website does not.
Yeah they are not that informative but at least he aint hating on gear like some reviews do (not on DJWORX of course). I truly believe Mark and co have it about nailed on, with the likes of Mojaxx providing good short clips about stuff. Mike from Phase one on youtube is great too, his reviews are definitely informal but always gives stuff a good hammering so you get to see features.
the feet are no issue in a solid flightcase.
this and the 1210 version are great for both the DJ and the hifi consumer
If you guys look for the Technics SL-1200 GR, you can contact my friend Francesco, from the record store “Music Avenue Paris” in Paris, France.
He’s since april an official Technics retailer so we played our sets for the record store day with these units^^!
Google “Music Avenue Paris” and feel free to contact him from my part.
why wouldn’t you get a turntablist on there to really talk about scratching??
I saw videos that scratch without having problems given by the new feet! Enough this bullshit that the 1200 GR has problems of non-stiffness as the old sl 1200! The fact that the feet are softer so that during the scrach there are too much stress … SL 1200 GR is the new standard for audiophiles and DJs!
…of course when those feet are screwed in, they have totally different behaviour compared to one in the image. That bolt, cannot move that way when it’s screwed.