[Norman Tracy]

Introduced at High End Munich 2018, scheduled to be shown in North America at RMAF in October.

http://www.almedio.co.jp/optora/

[jsm71]

Sorry, but anytime analog needs to be turned into digital then back to an analog signal there is something lost in the translation.  I don't want my pops and clicks to sound artificial.   

[woodsyi]

I don't know that it involves ADC, DSP, DAC.  It only has analog out.  The company is not saying what goes on inside to generate the final output signal.  I know ELP was not digitized.  See this video.  I am curious if it uses the same method as ELP or some new advanced optical sampling/modulation process has been developed.

But the dust -- how does a laser read a dirty groove?

[Norman Tracy]

In this video https://www.analogplanet.com/content/walk-halls-high-end-munich-2018-analogplanet-editor-michael-fremer about 5 minutes in Michael Fremer encounters the OPTORA. The pictured unit is a non-working prototype so any comments on the sound are in the future (assuming it gets past vaporware stage and into production). Fremer interviews an employee of Almedio and through the language barrier of New York English vs Japanese English one learns the following:

• LP is read using no physical contact via laser.
• Five laser beams are used. One to measure distance above disk. Two to obtain focus on L & R groove walls. Two to read L & R groove walls.
• Almedio is in the laser disk drive (CD, CDROM, BR, etc) business and is leveraging that technology into the OPTORA.
• System is fully analog with both line level and phono level outputs.
• Asked about how the player reacts to dust and dirt in groove a good answer was not forthcoming.

Below I will add some links to info about the original laser LP turntable the ELP. In the TAS review like others of the time the issue of noise from the fact there is no rock pushing aside dirt looms large. Should they make it to market it will be interesting to see if the reboot of this technology when ultrasonic LP cleaners are becoming so popular makes a difference.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laser_turntable

http://www.elpj.com/

http://www.theabsolutesound.com/articles/elp-lt-1lrc-laser-turntable/

JV writes in his TAS review "Now, there are various ways to assess the ELP’s sonic signature. At one point in his Stereophile review, Fremer compared the sound of LPs through the ELP to the sound of mastertapes. All of the mechanical resonances and colorations of turntables, tonearms, and cartridges having been eliminated—all of that jazzed-up, inaccurate sweetening and energizing having been stripped away—one is left, said he, with something closer to what the tapeheads recorded. I can see his point. The ELP does have some of the qualities of mastertapes— dynamic smoothness (or continuousness), much inner detail presented in a nonanalytical way, and an audiophile-neutral tonal balance. However, it needs to be said that, unlike the ELP, mastertapes do not trade off large-scale dynamic contrasts to achieve continuousness, do not sacrifice bloom and dimensionality to achieve clarity, and do not deracinate tone color to achieve neutrality. If they did, we wouldn’t extol them."

Total speculation on my part is that perhaps the merits coming from no mechanical resonances and getting stylus tip mass out of the playback path were in the case of the ELP implementation held back by less than high-end analog electronics?