How to hook up your vintage turntable

Vintage turntables do not have any amplifier circuits built in. The signal passes straight from the cartridge to the output cables. They must be connected to a receiver/amp with a phono input. If your unit doesn’t have a phono input, you can get an external phono preamp. Why a phono section? A phono preamp does two things. First, it boosts the signal to a similar level to line level sources. Second, it applies equalization. Frequencies are not recorded to a record in the same levels as they are played at. There is something called an RIAA equalization curve. Bass frequencies are recorded at a much lower level. If you plug a record player into a line level input like AUX, you will have to turn the volume way up to hear it well, and it will sound very tinny. It won’t be a small difference. You need a phono preamp to be able to use your record player.

 If your record player has a ground wire, make sure to connect it to your receiver. There should be a ground lug on your amp. It just makes sure the ground wire is connected firmly to the chassis of your amp. If you don’t hook the ground wire up, you will get a lot of hum. Not all turntables are designed to need a ground wire. So if yours doesn’t have one don’t worry about it. 

How to hook up your speakers

Make sure to connect speaker wires securely and neatly to your amp’s binding posts. If they short it can cause very expensive damage to the amplifier. Make sure there aren’t any loose strands of wire that could short. There shouldn’t be any extra bare wire hanging out of the terminals, don’t strip away more insulation than you need to.