Fluance RT85 Reference High Fidelity Vinyl Turntable Record Player with Ortofon 2M Blue Cartridge, Acrylic Platter, Speed Control Motor, High Mass MDF Wood Plinth, Vibration Isolation Feet - Walnut

Definitely recommend this turntable. I believe it is probably the best turntable under $1000. So easy to set up. Sounds amazing. I mean the stylus on this turntable alone is worth half the price of the turntable and you get an acrylic platter. The turntable is dead silent. Even when playing with speakers on the same surface there is no resonance. It comes out of the box exactly as it is stated. When I set it up I used the suggested settings. The weight is spot on. I set it the tracking force as recommended and then put it on a scale and it was within .002 grams. I set the anti skate and then tested it and it was perfectly still. When I pulled out my protractor the cartridge was already aligned. So easy to set up and easy to listen to. If youre looking stop now. This is a fantastic turntable. UPDATE------------------------------------------------------- This turntable produces so much detail. A very spacious sound stage with wonderful reproduction of the instruments and vocals. I can really get an idea of where everyone was standing in the recording studio. I cant say enough about the quality of the Ortofon 2M Blue cartridge. That combined with a great tone arm, a plinth that is built on top of rubber spring loaded feet and an acrylic platter. It is going to be hard to beat this combination for less than $1000. It is very easy to set up. As I previously stated just follow the instructions and you are off and running. You can trust that head shell will be properly aligned and that the tracking force and anti-skate will be accurate. The amount of detail that Fluance put into building this turntable really shines through. It even comes with white gloves to keep finger prints off of the beautiful finish. The motor is dead silent and the speed control really works. There is no detectable wow and flutter with this turntable. Even the queuing lever is top notch. There really is nothing about this turntable that I find to be a negative. If this turntable were double the price I could still justify recommending it. You will not be disappointed. If you find my review to be useful please take the time to vote it as helpful. Thank you for your time and enjoy your new turntable.

Takes a bit of patience to put together. The white gloves are a nice touch to leave no greasy finger prints while assembling it. I had to take one off several times to make adjustments for weights, cartridge and balancing. Better with bare hand for accuracy. I love how accurate it tracks and it’s very smooth. Unlike any turntable I’ve owned. It’s definitely an investment for vinyl lovers. I traded up from an Audio Technica lp-160. The Ortofon cartridge has a nice, but exaggerated high and low end sound on my Polk speakers. I have 2 towers with built in subs, 2 extra A channel front speakers, large center speaker and rear center speaker, for an extra surround sound, 2 wall mounted rear speakers and 2 very small Energy effects channel speakers, in a small living room. It’s sound immersion to say the least. I like to switch to my Sure TypeIV cartridge for some playback. It’s a much lower volume cartridge, but cost twice as much as the Ortofon. I’m still just breaking the turntable in, but the sound it reproduces is pretty amazing. Definitely the best turntable under $500 on the market. You will not find a better price anywhere else. I looked for three months. It’s the same on eBay or Overstock.com or direct from Fluance. Highly recommended. P.S. the auto stop function does not work for me either. I was asked if it’s power rating: the web site says 100-240 volts. It should work anywhere in the world then. Hope that helps. An update! I like the cartridge it comes with, a huge bargain in the price of the turntable. I upgraded to the Ortofon 2M Bronze in July. It sounds even better now! It’s almost as expensive as the unit itself, but so worth it. BTW, you can’t just change out the stylus. Red&Blue only or Bronze&Black only. They have different engines in the cartridge to match the correct stylus. Thanks for looking. Further update. I bought the Ortofon 2M black stylus to go with the bronze. It’s a huge investment, cost double what the turntable does, but omg. The sound it produces is amazing. It takes a few months to break in, then wow! I bought it to play my quadrophonic albums. It has a shibata stylus that gets deep into the groves for amazing sound. I hear things that I had never experienced before. New instruments, and background vocals. It’s also very unforgiving on poor quality or worn vinyl. It exposes every flaw that is on the record. So mainly newer or Japanese pressings only. I can change out the black for the bronze in about a minute for poorer quality pressings. They both work on the same cartridge, which has a faster motor than the blue one does, which makes for superior sound. If you upgrade I recommend the PNP premounted cartridge. It’s lighter weight, just plugs in, no alignment worries for a few dollars more.

The sound quality is excellent! Take the time needed to property adjust the arm!

I am not an audiophile, just a guy who likes to listen to records. I bought the white Fluance RT85 because of the positive reviews and because it looked cool with its acrylic platter, etc. I have owned many different turntables and record players over the years, but this one is the most expensive. Overall its an okay turntable, but thats probably as far as I would go with it. Colored vinyl really pops on the white, though the visual aesthetic proves more impressive than actually using it. The entire tonearm mechanism feels super cheap. The tonearm lever, stand and safety latch actually feels like something youd find on a cheapo plastic portable record player like a Crosley. Maybe I got a bad one, but thats my honest opinion. Theres a lot of slack in the lever, it bounces the arm if you lift it too quickly and the tonearm safety latch feels like its going to break off every time I use it. My last turntable was a Pro-ject Essential III and even though the body of this Fluance is much more substantial, the entire experience of lowering the needle with the tonearm lever on the Pro-ject was more solid and satisfying, whereas the RT85 feels flimsy and crappy. The Ortofon 2m Blue looks cool, but to be honest, for a $250 cartridge it doesnt really sound much better to me than the OM10 on my Pro-ject, which didnt sound much better to me than the ADC QLM32 Mrk III on my Hitachi HT-324 from the 80s. I told you Im not an audiophile. Aside from the whole tonearm mess, I still think this is an okay turntable. Not worth $500 in my opinion, but one mans trash may be another mans treasure. Honestly, I was somewhat disappointed. But, just like all hobbies, we all buy new, more expensive gadgets, looking for perfection, but only getting mediocrity. I was hoping the grass was actually greener, but turns out its just more grass.

Wow, wow, wow. I should have made the leap year ago! Fluance RT85 with Ortofon Blue cartridge is a fantastic value, fabulous sound and great quality for the price. Would recommend anyone on the fence like I was is to make the leap. You will not be disappointed!

This is my 4 month review. I decided to hold off and put this baby through its paces before putting my 2 cents in. In a nutshell, after owning many low and high-end tables over my 40 years of vinyl-love, this one is the absolute sweet spot to me. Sub $500, there is no better deal or higher quality TT for the money. You get a 2M Blue, super high-end acrylic platter, top-notch quality plinth, quality everything else, and a partridge in a pear tree. As I said on the tag line....if youre looking for a TT and want epic quality for the money without breaking the bank, but are unsure what to get, just pull the trigger man. You wont regret it.

I think this is the perfect turntable if you are new or looking to get back into vinyl, as long as you know you are going to stick with this hobby. It’s a lot for my first real turntable but after trying out a suitcase record player (absolute trash and ruins your records over time) I knew that the upfront cost would get me something I could truly love and enjoy. This turn table as been all that and more! I listen to it for hours every day. I installed an LED strip under the back to light up the platter.

I am really enjoying this turntable and listening to my record albums again.

This turntable is great. Great price, amazing sound and a quality platter that not many turntables come with these days. If you want sound not altered by anything digital this is the way to go. The big catch on this one, you will need to buy a pre amp as well. This turntable doesn’t come with one built in, for the sake of not altering the sound digitally. The Fluance one on Amazon works great, but it is definitely necessary.

Purchased this fluence RT85 from Amazon, it was a used unit I assumed returned and refurbished, or demo or something it did not specify, but the auto stop function was intermentioned at best maybe 2 out of 10 times it would stop, the cartridge was very dusty and dirty, it had differently been used, I cleaned it up it seemed OK and sounded fine, the dust cover had a couple light scuffs on it but I was expecting something like that buying a used unit, functionality wise though the auto stop feature not working reliably was unacceptable for $500. I gusee it was not checked out correctly, Fluence makes a great product and a good value, just buy a new one not a used one.