Pure Fidelity The Symphony

Old world craftsmanship with new world precision.

The Symphony turntable immerses you in an emotional musical experience achievable only with the highest level of analog playback. Central to its performance is the extraordinary harmony of Pure Fidelity’s “hybrid” design. It provides a rich midrange, making instruments and vocals feel real and palpable. Boasting an exceptionally low noise floor, music emerges from an inky black background with detailed highs and excellent bass resolution. In line with a component of such distinction, the deck incorporates our most advanced strategies against shelf-borne vibration and resonance. The result is a musical instrument of rare distinction.

Pure Fidelity “hybrid” design.

Understanding that the plinth has a profound impact on turntable acoustics, various designs have their strengths and weaknesses. High-mass constructions deliver deep bass but can feel dull. Low-mass designs excel in agility and dynamics but often sound too bright. Suspended decks offer excellent timing but may lack depth in bass. To capture the best attributes of each, Pure Fidelity’s founder, John Stratton, developed the ultimate “hybrid” design. By employing an intermediate mass built upon an ultra-MDF plinth, the result is an impeccably neutral sound. Bass notes are strong yet lively, and the highs are refined without being piercing.

Ultra MDF plinth.  To maximize the advantages of our “hybrid” design, The Symphony’s plinth is constructed with a 75-mm core of significantly enhanced Medium Density Fibreboard, known as Ultra MDF. This material surpasses standard MDF with higher density, superior fibers, and improved machinability, allowing for far more precise assembly. Additionally, ultra MDF plays a vital role in controlling resonance, as detailed below.

Conquering Vibration and Resonance.  Much like a microphone, a phono cartridge converts mechanical vibrations into electrical signals. Importantly, the cartridge not only captures the movement from the record groove but also unwanted vibrations caused by sound from the loudspeakers impacting the turntable and its supporting shelf. Since the cartridge cannot distinguish between musical vibrations and extraneous ones, these unwanted vibrations can degrade playback, harming musicality and collapsing the soundstage. This is why The Symphony incorporates an exceptionally thorough approach to suppress resonance. The aluminum isolation platform, GAIA™ IV isolation footers, and ultra MDF plinth all collaborate to produce music with such pristine clarity, reinforcing the essence of our name, Pure Fidelity.

6061 aircraft aluminum isolation platform.

Highly regarded in aircraft and automotive construction, the 6061 aluminum alloy provides superb rigidity, resisting deformation with a Young’s modulus of 10 million psi. At a substantial thickness of 1 inch (25 mm), this isolation platform—unique to the Symphony—delivers exceptional stability. Additionally, since the platform is isolated from the ultra-MDF plinth by GAIA™ IV isolation footers, it retains all the advantages inherent in Pure Fidelity’s “hybrid” design.

GAIA IV isolation footers.

Celebrated with numerous industry accolades, the patented IsoAcoustics GAIA™ isolation footers significantly enhance the focus and expression of musical reproduction. It was only fitting that we collaborated with IsoAcoustics, to develop a lower-profile version specifically for Pure Fidelity turntables. The Symphony incorporates five of these exceptional GAIA IV footers.

Stainless Steel Arm-Board.

Coming standard with The Symphony, every component influences the overall sound quality, we offer an armboard made from high-grade stainless steel. Renowned for its strength and stability, stainless steel provides an unwavering platform for the tonearm, effectively dampening vibrations that could color the sound. This leads to improved tracking accuracy and a purer signal path from the cartridge to your ears, allowing you to experience music with heightened clarity and dynamic range.To achieve such superior performance, we employ advanced CNC machining techniques in crafting our stainless steel armboards. Our custom tools achieve repeatable tolerances of 1/1000 inch, ensuring each piece meets our exacting standards. This meticulous machining process not only enhances the armboard’s structural integrity but also its ability to isolate the tonearm from external vibrations. The result is a richer, more lifelike listening experience that embodies our commitment to exceptional audio performance.

Ultra-precise CNC machining.  To capitalize on the superior qualities of 6061 aircraft aluminum, we apply highly precise computer numerical control (CNC) machining, employing custom tools with a repeatable tolerance of 1/1000 inch—roughly one-third the thickness of a human hair. We also implement CNC machining on the ultra-MDF plinth, sub-platter, Delrin® platter, and even the high-density foam packing carriers. The result is unit-to-unit consistency of the utmost standard.

Ruby bearing in a low-friction bronze shaft.

By the time sound reaches your ears, the output of a moving coil cartridge can be amplified by a factor exceeding 10,000. Consequently, even the tiniest imperfections in the turntable’s drive system can become audible concerns. Therefore, although we could acquire 100 steel bearings for the price of one ruby bearing, we opt to stick with ruby. Ruby exhibits remarkable hardness, rated 9 on the Mohs scale—only diamond is harder. Similarly, we opted for bronze instead of the industry-standard brass for the bearing shaft. Bronze provides better durability, higher strength, and a lower coefficient of friction.

Perfecting rotational speed.  The accuracy of vinyl playback hinges on consistent rotational speed. While significant fluctuations in platter speed would noticeably alter the musical pitch, even tiny, brief speed variations can blur the timbre of instruments, creating a barrier between you and the music. To ensure the utmost precision in speed maintenance, Pure Fidelity collaborates the Conductors speed and it’s AC synchronous motor, pulley system, dual drive belts, aluminum/stainless steel sub-platter, and Delrin® platter. The outcome is an extraordinary ability to reproduce musical timbre with faithful accuracy.

Conductor quartz locked speed control.

To achieve the highest level of precision in motor control, we developed the Conductor outboard speed controller. This unit features a quartz lock mechanism that maintains rotational accuracy within ±0.003%. Recognizing that many classic vinyl records were produced before such precision was standard, the Conductor also offers separate rear-panel pitch adjustments for 33-1/3 and 45 rpm. A robust component in its own right, the speed control isolates the motor drive voltage from the noise, spikes, and distortions of household AC mains, generating a pure sine wave of exceptional stability.

Custom AC synchronous motor. To meet our exacting standards, the motor is quiet, stable, and entirely free from “clogging”—those unwanted pulses of torque. We have equipped our 12-volt AC synchronous motor with custom modifications that reduce clogging to the point of elimination.

Stainless steel pulley and two drive belts.

After thorough listening experiments across multiple belt styles and configurations, we opted for two drive belts with round cross-sections. This arrangement offers the best sound quality for our drive system.

Large-profile aluminum/steel sub-platter. Emphasizing precision, Pure Fidelity insists on a sub-platter made from 6061 aircraft-grade aluminum and stainless steel, both CNC-machined to a meticulous tolerance of 1/1000 inch. The Symphony showcases a robust 1.5-inch (38mm) thick sub-platter—the largest we’ve ever produced. This ensures near-perfect roundness and exceptional speed stability.

Massive, 60-mm Delrin® platter.

Some manufacturers opt for glass platters, believing low mass is the optimal approach. Others choose aluminum for its high mass properties. However, in both scenarios, you’re compelled to use a mat on top to mitigate resonance and ringing. To overcome this limitation, we selected an inherently non-resonant platter material: an engineering thermoplastic called Delrin. A classic choice for applications requiring high stiffness, low friction, and excellent dimensional stability, Delrin also shares many properties with vinyl records. Moreover, it possesses the mass needed to maintain speed stability. We evaluated numerous other thermoplastics but ultimately chose Delrin for its exceptional sound quality. It delivers a very balanced frequency response with an almost organic feel to the music.

SS-100 Ruby - Steel record isolator.

Not only does the supplied record weight flatten and stabilize your LPs, but it also suppresses micro-vibrations around the record label that can introduce subtle noise and veil the music. The SS-100 is a record isolator made of stainless steel and incorporates ten micro ruby balls. It slips over the spindle and rests upon the record label, contacting it through the ruby balls embedded in black Delrin to avoid deadening the sound. The result is a quieter, more detailed, and lifelike listening experience. The SS-100 measures 0.75 inches tall, 2.75 inches in diameter, and weighs 1.7 pounds (20 x 70 mm; 760 g).

Acrylic Dust Cover

This is an optional accessory that fits our Symphony profile. It is made of ¼” thick acrylic with polished edges and has a Pure Fidelity logo embedded in the inside rear panel. These are custom manufactured to our exact specifications and are specified as “Museum Quality” A very elegant solution to a common problem ……Keeping dust off your investmentSize: 22’ Wide x 19” Deep x 10” Deep

Dimensions and weight. 20″ wide (508 mm)  x 16.5″ deep (419 mm) x   9″ high (average 228 mm)   70 lbs