|
A record changer or autochanger is a device that plays multiple phonograph records in sequence without user intervention. Record changers first appeared in the late 1920s, and were common until the 1980s. ==History== The record changer with a stepped center spindle design was invented by Eric Waterworth of Hobart, Australia, in 1925.〔http://apc-online.com/twa/history6.html,""TOMORROW'S WORLD, subtitle,"Electric record changing salonola (1925)""〕 He and his father took it to Sydney, and arranged with a company called Home Recreations to fit it into its forthcoming phonograph, the Salonola. Although this novelty was demonstrated at the 1927 Sydney Royal Easter Show, Home Recreations went into liquidation and the Salonola was never marketed. In 1928 the Waterworths traveled to London, where they sold their patent to the new Symphony Gramophone and Radio Co. Ltd.〔http://archive.amol.org.au/foundmade/item.asp?MusID=T106&ItemNo=1&MusName=Sound+Preservation+Asso, ""found & made IN TASMANIA, subtitle, "Waterworth Prototype""〕 Eric Waterworth built three prototypes of his invention, one of which was sold to Home Recreations as a model for its proposed Salonola record player as cited above, which is now reportedly in the collection of the Powerhouse Museum in Sydney. The second prototype went to England with Eric and his father, and was sold as part of the above-cited deal with the Symphony Gramophone and Radio Company. The fate of this machine is unknown. The third prototype was never fully assembled, and lay in pieces under the Waterworths' house for something like sixty years. After Eric's death, the family found the dissembled parts of the machine and offered them to the Sound Preservation Association of Tasmania. The offer was accepted, and an enthusiastic member began the task of reassembling the prototype. Only a few small parts were found to be missing, and enough remained to finish assembling it and restoring it to a crude working condition. This prototype record changer is now on display at the Sound Preservation Association of Tasmania resource centre in the Hobart suburb of Bellerive.〔http://archive.amol.org.au/foundmade/item.asp?MusID=T106&ItemNo=1&MusName=Sound+Preservation+Association+of+Tasmania+Inc.〕〔http://www.jobfuturestas.com/soundpres/pages/show.html〕 The first commercially successful record changer was the "Automatic Orthophonic" model by the Victor Talking Machine Company, which was launched in the USA in 1927.〔^ http://midimagic.sgc-hosting.com/changers.htm ""RECORD CHANGERS", see part 1, "THE EARLY YEARS""〕 On a conventional gramophone or phonograph, the limited playing time of 78 rpm gramophone records (averaging a little over four minutes per 12" side, and a little over three per 10" side) meant that listeners had to get up to change records at regular intervals. The Automatic Orthophonic allowed the listener to load a stack of several records into the machine, which would then be automatically played in sequence for a much longer uninterrupted listening time. By the late 1950s, Garrard and Dual dominated the high-end record changer market in the USA.〔(""RECORD CHANGERS", see Part 3, subtitle, "Dual and Garrard emerge on top"" )〕 From the late 1950s through the late 1960s, VM Corporation (Voice of Music) of Benton Harbor, Michigan, USA, dominated the lower-priced original equipment manufacturer (OEM) American record changer market.〔 Most VM (Voice of Music) record changers were sold to OEM audio manufacturers such as Zenith and installed in console-sized, portable or compact low- to mid-priced stereo or mono systems. VM record changers sold to OEMs were not labeled with the Voice of Music trademark on the unit itself, but only those retailed by VM Corporation, either as separate components or integral parts of VM phonographs, were labeled with the VM (Voice of Music) trademark on the changer. Outside the USA, VM record-changer technology was licensed to several manufacturers. Telefunken, of then West Germany, was one such company to sign a licensing agreement with VM Corporation.〔http://www.hem.passagen.se/sodas/vxarteng.htm "RECORDCHANGERS In Sweden"〕〔(""RECORD CHANGERS", see Part 3, subtitle, "THE INGENUITY YEARS" )〕 By the late 1960s (1968), when BSR - MacDonald displaced VM as the world largest record-changer manufacturer and dominated the OEM changer market in the USA as well. Most mid-priced consumer record players of the 1950s through 1970s were equipped with changers.〔http://midimagic.sgc-hosting.com/changerz.htm ""RECORD CHANGERS", see part 4, "THE DECLINE AND FALL OF THE RECORD CHANGER""〕 But record-stacking changers eventually became rarer due to the gradually growing belief that they contributed greatly to record wear and "warping," and were eventually superseded by manual turntables which served as separate parts of component systems, which played only one record at a time and saved record wear by gentler treatment during play. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Record changer」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
|