Company & Product Overview

This article is on the new T2 turntables from our friends at Pro-Ject Audio. Back in 1991, Heinz Lichtenegger had a vision that vinyl was going to make a big comeback and founded Pro-Ject Audio with the desire to bring high-performance audio down in price by using great manufacturing processes coupled with economies of scale. Almost all Pro-Ject components are designed at their engineering facility in Austria and manufactured at their Eastern European plants. The formula of controlling all parts in the production process and making high-value products turned out to be a huge success. Pro-Ject is now one of the largest manufacturers of turntables in the world.

Pro-Ject now makes turntables from very entry-level to the extreme high end, but their T series has had very wide appeal as it's a step up from the least expensive, with much of the technology in their higher-priced turntables.

The original T1 model these T2s descend from was introduced back in 2019 and was designed to offer much of the tech found in their very popular Debut series. These improved versions of the T1 in the new T2 package actually surpass those Debut models from that time period.

There are three new T2 models, but they are all based on the same turntable. We will review the T2 and then discuss the next two models to help you decide if they are worth the extra cost.

Design & Build Quality

Like almost all of the Pro-Ject turntables, the T2 is a manual belt drive type. This means you start the platter up with a button push, pick up the tonearm, move it over the record, and lower it using the damped cueing. When your record ends, you do all of this in reverse. This design uses the fewest moving parts to keep noise and vibrations away from the signal path.

You can ask any turntable enthusiast about their opinion on belt-drive turntables vs. direct-drive turntables, and you’ll usually get some passionate answers. At Audio Advice, we feel both designs have merit, but if you look at the top-rated turntables in the world, almost all of them are belt-drive. We feel it is also easier to design a great-sounding belt-drive turntable than a direct-drive model, especially in the price ranges these models fall within.

The build quality of the T2 is excellent, especially the tonearm, which we were super impressed with. You also have three color options: piano black, satin white, or vinyl wood laminate.

Features & Technology

The list of features and tech found in the new T2 tables is very impressive, especially for their price point. We will start from the bottom and work our way up.

The three feet for the T2 are vibration-resistant to help isolate the T2 from picking up vibrations from nearby speakers. We do wish they were adjustable for leveling, but Pro-Ject does make a variety of turntable isolation bases that do have adjustable feet. Even though they are vibration resistant, it is still a good idea with any turntable to keep it away from speakers capable of deep bass if you can.

The large plinth is CNC machined out of a solid composite material. It is a combination of MDF with a foil wrap to reduce resonance. Pro-Ject chose this material to reduce any vibrations inside the plinth. The motor is mounted to the plinth with isolation material in between. Pro-Ject also uses an advanced electronic control system for the motor to ensure it spins at a constant speed. It is also nice that you get a switch on the left side to go between 33 and 45 without having to move the belt like many belt drive units.

The sub-platter for the T2 series is mounted to a very precision-built main bearing with tolerances down to .001mm. The bearing uses a hardened steel axle and brass bushing.

The thick, blasted tempered glass platter on the T2 weighs almost 4 pounds. This heavy platter creates a great flywheel effect, improving speed stability. The included felt mat tops off the glass platter.

The tonearm on the T2 is a big upgrade from the T1 with several improvements. The T2 arm has an effective length of 9”, which is pretty standard for higher-end tonearms as the longer length results in less tracking error. The massive bearing assembly was updated to have even lower friction to accommodate the longer arm. The arm is a one-piece design including the headshell for better vibration control. The polished nickel-plated rear counterweight is decoupled from the arm. It comes preset for the included Sumiko Rainier cartridge, but you can loosen a set screw to make tracking force adjustments for a different cartridge. You will just need to use the stylus pressure gauge that comes in the box, as there are now tracking force markings, then lock down the set screw. The anti-skating is variable and easily adjusted with a knob on the side of the arm. As a matter of fact, that is the only thing you have to adjust during setup since the Rainier cartridge comes pre-aligned and balanced. Just turn the knob to “2” and you are done.

We can not say how much we love the Sumiko Rainier phono cartridge it comes with. We first heard this on the new Debut Evo from Pro-ject a while back and were blown away by its sound. It tracks great and has a very sweet yet detailed presentation. Like all Sumiko cartridges, it is handmade in Yokohama, Japan. But the cool part is you can upgrade its performance by simply purchasing a better stylus when you’re ready. Sumiko currently has two steps up from which you could choose. The tonearm height, while not adjustable, is preset to have perfect VTA for all of their Oyster models, allowing you to move up to some of their popular moving coil models later without worrying about VTA. We don’t know if Sumiko planned it that way, but all of their upper-end Oyster models are within 2 100ths of a mm in height.

So, that is the entry-level T2, which certainly brings a lot to the party at its price point.

The next model up is the one we think will be the best choice for most vinyl lovers.

The T2 Super Phono is an identical turntable to the T2 but with one big exception. It comes with a built-in phono preamp. Now, you may think at first, what is the big deal about that, lots of turntables come with a phono preamp built-in. Well, the big deal is this phono preamp is based on the $200 Pro-Ject Phono Box S2 with a very similar moving magnet phono preamp. So the built-in one will totally blow away any built-in phono preamp in almost all stereo receivers and integrated amps until you get into the multi-thousand dollar range. You also have less chance of noise getting into your cables as the signal will be at a high level instead of the low level that normally comes out of a turntable. And on the cables, all of the T2 models come with Pro-Ject’s $69 Connect phono cable, which is far superior to most of the cables included with turntables in this price category.

So, if you are considering the T2 and do not have a totally awesome phono preamp, we highly recommend you spend an extra $100 and get the Super Phono version.

If you later want to use a better phono preamp or moving coil cartridge, you can even defeat it with the push of a button.

The most expensive model in the new T2 line is the T2 W Wi-Fi Streaming Turntable. We are having a hard time wrapping our head around this one, even though it won an EISA award recently in the turntable category. It is identical to the T2 Super Phono, but with WiFi streaming built in.

From a Wi-Fi streaming standpoint, it does have some great features. It uses all the latest WLAN standards and 2×2 MIMO, which allows for theoretical speeds that are faster than typical modern internet connections. The T2 can stream in standard compressed format or 24bit/48kHz and can send the signal out to an unlimited number of devices. It is also easy to set up with the Pro-Ject app.

The use case we see for this would be if you had a whole house or another audio system in a different location than your turntable and wanted to get your vinyl sound into that system. But for most people, you put your turntable in the same room as your audio system and enjoy the music. It does fill the need for WiFi vinyl streaming, but it is currently priced at twice the price of the T2, plus a nice bottle of wine!

Performance

Set up is another bonus we noticed when we unpacked the T2. Everything is pre-mounted, aligned, and balanced from the factory. All you have to do is make the audio connections, put the belt on, add the outer glass platter, set the anti-skate, connect the power supply, and you are done.

As we typically do, we set the T2 Super Phono up in a room with a McIntosh integrated amp and a big set of Sonus Faber tower speakers. Yes, it is overkill for something like this, but we feel it's the best way to find out how something really sounds.

When we had tested the T1 we were blown away at how well the table tracked which was even more apparent on the T2. This new arm and Rainer cartridge combo work really well together. We heard very little breakup even in complex musical passages. Everything was warm, spacious, and with a great flow.

Our toe-tapping content tests came out very well too as we easily got into the rhythm of the music with the T2.

The only drawback we noticed with the T1 and Ortofon cartridge combo was its lack of deep bass impact. We have to say, this is greatly improved with the T2 and Rainier.

Overall Recommendation

The T2 lineup offers the vinyl lover who is not interested in lots of tweaking of their rig, a great way to get into a pretty serious turntable for not a whole lot of money in the grand scheme of high-performance turntables. The T2 Super Phono is by far the best value and what we would recommend to just about everyone.

But if you look at the Pro-Ject lineup, just above the T2 is the Debut EVO. While it has a slightly shorter tonearm, it has even better bearings and is made of Carbon Fiber. The platter is also better damped, and it has upgraded feet with a better motor mount. But, it requires you to know how to balance a tonearm properly to get it set up. So, it somewhat comes down to ease of setup or a bit better performance. What we would love to see is for Pro-Ject to put a Carbon Fiber version of the T2 arm with more adjustments on the EVO, and maybe that will come down the road one day.

Should you consider going beyond $550-650 in your turntable investment, we find you hear big improvements in turntables as you move up. The improvements as you move up are pretty easy to hear each time you listen to a better one. Remember, the sound begins at your table, so the better the table, the more music you’ll pull off your records. The choice really comes down to how deep you see yourself getting into the world of vinyl fun!

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