˻ PREMIERE ˼

⌈ TENTOGRA is a Polish company, founded in 2015 by Mr. WOJCIECH SAMOŁYK, an architect by trade. The company's headquarters is located in Ksawerów near Łódź, and its offer includes high-class turntables. We are the first to test the WoWo model. ⌋

HE FIRST AND STILL THE MOST IMPORTANT Tentogra turntable is the Oscar. Although work on its new version is currently underway, they focus primarily on integrating the battery powering the motor with the base and other changes not quite visible from the outside. Its main advantage when it comes to design, is form.

It was the first project of Wojciech Samołyk. As he says, he dared to try to design his first turntable thanks to Jerzy Owsiak, the man behind The Great Orchestra of Christmas Charity, to whom he promised to build and then donate the first unit. Oscar with the number 0001, actually a prototype, was auctioned off by the GOCC in 2020.

And there was something to bid on. The turntable was named after Oscar Niemeyer (1907-2012), a world-class architect. Among his most important projects are buildings in Brasília, the new capital of Brazil, built in 1957–1964: the Cathedral of Our Lady of Aparecida, and the Headquarters of the French Communist Party.

In this group we can also find the Palace of Congresses, located at the Three Authorities Square. Please take a look at this building and we will be closer to where I am today and the form of the turntable we are talking about will become understandable and even natural. As I wrote on the occasion of its test - it seems that it was the only possible one; test → HERE.

The Oscar, however, was a very large device. Too big for many people. Therefore, in 2018 Wojtek Samołyk proposed a smaller Gramy model, and now, even more compact, WoWo.

| A few simple words…

WOJCIECH SAMOŁYK
Owner, designer

THE VISUAL PARADIGM OF A TURNTABLE in many cases has not changed much for over 100 years, i.e. since the times of Emil Berliner, the creator of a flat gramophone record (emphasis - ed.). Shapes of modern turntables reproduced again and again by many manufacturers, referring to the classic ones, make it very difficult for designers of these devices to create something new, worthy the 21st century.

However, the turntables do not have to look the same and they do not have to be similar. Trends in architecture and art have changed over the centuries, often within a decade. And we entered the new millennium already 22 years ago. The development of all 21st century technologies, including visual ones, inspire me to make my turntables follow the New Era. Therefore, the concept of the GRAMY VTA model is inspired by the possibility of on-the-fly VTA adjustment of inexpensive tonearms while listening to the record. Visually, it refers to modern aviation and car constructions.

The first Tentogra WoWo turntable was ordered and bought back when it only existed as a draft in my computer. Trusted by the client, curious about the final result, I have made every effort to create the most perfect and the most beautiful product. Interestingly, its first sketches were made before Gramy VTA, which is, in fact, an extension of the WoWo concept. And this latter was designed for a wide range of audiophiles, especially due to its compact size and affordable price. WS

▌ WoWo

The WOWO IS REALLY visually and structurally compact turntable. Its outline is closed in a square with sides of 50 x 45 cm and it is 17 cm high (without the arms). Thanks to the foot spacing of 40 (width) x 26 cm (depth), it will easily fit on not too deep furniture. This is also helped by positioning the motor very close to the platter and moving it to the rear where it is placed in the cutout made for this purpose in the base. The constructor comments on it this way:

Thanks to its compact design, Tentogra WoWo has a very favorable center of gravity distribution. I used a DC motor like in the Oscar model to drive the platter. Each of the speeds of 33, 45 and 78 RPM is activated by a knob on the front of the turntable. The current speed is indicated by the appropriate LED on the turntable front. Below the switch there are the calibration holes for each speed. The motor is an independent object, not coupled with the structure, so it does not transfer vibrations to the plinth. One can also use a battery of my production, which is not standard equipment.

On the back you can see two "wings" - these are the bases for tonearms. They extend out to accommodate two 9 to 14 inches tonearms. Each of the bases is additionally equipped with a "tonearm stabilizer", i.e. a vibration damper. It is a cylinder visible from below, which counterbalances the weight of the arm - ideally both should be the same. The WoWo comes with the Kuzma Stogi Ref 313 tonearm, but it can also be ordered with other tonearms and even just a tonearm base. We tested the version with the 4Point arm, but the Stogi Ref 313 was also mounted at the rear; we'll come back to that later.

From the design point of view, we are dealing with a mass, non-decoupled, belt-driven turntable. It weighs 35 kg without accessories. It is available in two basic colors: black and silver. However, it is possible to anodize metal elements in any color. For veneering, the constructor uses many natural wood veneers, according to the customer's wishes.

⸜ DECK The turntable has an architectural form. It is somewhat reminiscent of the so-called "Flying wing", meaning an airplane without visible tail fins. When viewed from the front, you can see that the base is composed of three layers: the upper one is made of wood in the type chosen by the buyer, and the two lower ones are made of aluminum.

It is called "Precision aluminum". It is annealed at the factory and pre-milled with an accuracy of 0.1 mm. Only later a specific shape is cut out of it, glassed and anodized. These layers are bolted together, but there are Kevlar spacers between them. These are elements borrowed from the automotive industry - they are used to seal engines. The constructor says that he meant to extinguish the vibrations between the aluminum elements.

Visually, the base layers connect at the front in a sort of "control center". It is made of a knob, which is used to switch the rotation speeds, and orange LED diodes indicating its current value. We can choose from 33 1/3, 45 and 78 rpm. The latter is important because the designer is passionate about shellac records. And with them in mind, he installed the second, aforementioned arm in the turntable, and on it he installed the shellac cartridge, the Audio-Technica AT-MONO3/SP. There are three holes under the knob, used for precise speed calibration.

⸜ PLATTER The base is designed in such a way that the center of gravity is as close to the main bearing as possible. The platter is thus almost in the center of the base, symmetrically to the left and right side, and to some extent to the front and back. It is 51 mm high and made of polyacetate (POM) with a lowered center of gravity.

There is a piece of glass on top. It is not ordinary glass, but it is doped with carbon. They are cut not using water saws, but CNC machines, thanks to which - as Wojciech Samołyk says - it has perfect dimensions and nicely bevelled edges. This sandwich is the result of listening tests. As the designer says: “The sound from the POM itself was too dull for him. Glass aligns the band and this combination is, in my opinion, the best solution. This solution can also be found in other turntables, for example in the Ginga by Kondo. Regarding the main bearing Wojciech only refers to it as "steel and ceramic".

⸜ MOTOR The motor, as already mentioned, is located at the rear of the turntable. It is a asynchronous 24 V motor (DC) of the Korean company GGM. It is factory-fitted with a driver that allows to operate it. The change of speed means that the driver delivers a different voltage. The sleeve on the motor axis has been milled from aluminum and anodized. The torque is transferred to the platter by two flat belts from the German company Thakker.

Two belts instead of one are for better control of the motor over the platter. This solution can be found in products by many manufacturers. The downside of this solution is higher noise - two belts are more noisy than one, that's probably clear. In WoWo, the humming of the belts moving along the motor axis is audible but subtle. On the other hand, it increases at higher speeds and at 78 rpm. it is quite strong. Fortunately, apart from the latter case, it cannot be heard from a listening place.

⸜ POWER SUPPLY The version that we received for testing is powered by a battery called Blue Power 35 Ah (756 W/h), sufficient for ~ 68 hours of play. I know it from the Oscar model - its capacity is enough for several dozen hours of continuous play.

If you think that the power supply to the engine does not matter, then you are wrong. More and more manufacturers recognize that it is a full-fledged element of the turntable, as important as the platter or motor. It is enough to recall the German Brinkmann, which offers a tube power supply (RoNt II), or to recall my experiment with the Music Hall Stealth turntable. Instead of a standard, wall-mounted switching power supply, I powered it with a precise JPLAY Initio 3 power supply; more → HERE.

In the initial phase of the "Oscar project", Wojciech Samołyk used a battery with half the charging time. As he said then, after switching to a bigger one, he was surprised to notice that "the sound is louder". Yes, the power supply can change the sound beyond recognition.

Blue Power is a large box, painted in gray, with a blue liquid crystal display on the front panel. We can read on it the level of charge of the battery as percentage or as a bargraph. It uses lithium-ion batteries. The battery switches to charging mode automatically when discharged, but it can also be done manually, for example at night. It connects to the turntable with a thick cable with solid plugs. There are two safety switches next to the cable - it looks really cool.

The standard price of the Tentogra WoWo turntable includes a Presslift record clamp, one arm base with an "arm stabilizer" and a classic 230-240V power supply. Equipped with the Kuzma Stogi S-12 arm and the CAR-30 cartridge, it costs 9,990 Euro, and with the Stogi REF 313 arm and the CAR-40 11900 Euro The base for the second tonearm costs around 550 Euro.

In the standard configuration, the turntable rests on four anti-vibration feet. However, at an additional cost, it can be equipped with fantastic Divine Acoustic Kepler feet; more → HERE. They cost 450 Euro for 4 pieces. And it was the configuration that was tested, costing - without the cartridge - 15,350 Euro.

▌ SOUND

⸜ HOW WE LISTENED The TENTOGRA WOWO turntable was tested in the HIGH FIDELITY reference system. It was placed on the top shelf made of carbon fiber, on the Finite Elemente Pagode Edition MkII rack. I set the VTA for the cartridge with the REGA ATLAS scale, I also used the DS Audio ST-50 for cleaning the stylus.

During the tests I treated the TenToGra turntable as a complete system, but I listened to it with my cartridge. It was the MIYAJIMA LABORATORY DESTINY, mounted in the 4Point arm. On the other hand, the Audio-Technica AT-Mono3 / SP cartridge was used in the Stogi 313 arm. The signal from the tonearms was led with cables integrated with them to the RCM Audio Sensor Prelude IC phono preamplifier, from which the signal was sent via the Crystal Cable Absolute Dream interconnect.

Records used for the test | a selection

⸜ MICHIKO OGAWA, Oh Lady Be Good/Smile, Ultra Art Record UA-1004, 180 g, 78 RPM maxi-SP.
⸜ CLIFFORD JORDAN, Hello, Hank Jones, East World EWLF-98003, „Soundphile Series”, „Jazz Direct Disc”, 180 g LP (1978).
⸜ JOHN COLTRANE, Blue Train, Blue Note/Analogue Productions AP-81577, „45 RPM Limited Edition #2368”, 2 x 45 RPM, 180 g LP (1957/2008).
⸜ DIRE STRAITS, Brothers in Arms, Vertigo/Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab MFSL 2-441, „Special Limited Edition # 3000”, 2 x 45 RPM, 180 g LP (1985/2015).
⸜ GEORGE MICHAEL, Faith, Epic EPC 460000 1, LP (1987).
⸜ ELECTRIC LIGHT ORCHESTRA, Out of the Blue, Jet Records UAS 1100, LP (1977).
⸜ METALLICA, Master of Puppets Elektra Records/Warner Bros. Records 470908-1, „Metallica 45 RPM Series”, 2 x 45 RPM, 180 g LP (2008).

I COULDN’T STOP MYSELF from starting my listening sessions with an album that made a huge impression on me, namely MICHIKO OGAWA’S Oh Lady Be Good/Smile, released by the Japanese label Ultra Art Records; more → HERE. It is a disc cut with a speed of 78 rpm. (!), but a fine groove one.

WoWo showed the dynamics of this sound very well, its speed and the lack of audible coloration, associated with the analog and perceived as "warm" or "rounded". The lowest bass did not have perfect precision. This is how the "own sound" of the POM material from which the WoWo platter was made manifests itself. It wasn't clear though, and if I hadn't been nitpicking, I might not have noticed this modification.

This is because the frequency response is even here, meaning "present", from the highest treble to the low bass. I checked it with the CLIFFORD JORDAN’s "direct-to-disc" Hello, Hank Jones. The diagram on the technical description of the recording attached to the record shows that the instrumentalists were placed along four walls of the studio and separated from the others with partitions. The producer and sound engineer put it together in a stereo whole when recording on the varnish.

It is a very good recording in terms of dynamics and energy. WoWo shows these two elements very well, which could already be heard on the previous album. But only now did I see a real "fire" in it. Interestingly, the turntable does not emphasize the attack of the sound, nor the treble. As I said, it is tonally well-balanced. And yet it seems that the cymbals sparkle, that when a Hank Jones hits a piano key, it is a sonorous and immediate hit.

In the presentation of the tested turntable you can hear something that I would call a composure. With all this dynamics, sonority, etc. WoWo doesn't lose itself in attack. It even smoothes it a bit. Jordan's recording from New York's Media Sound studio has a slightly withdrawn midrange. This is the result of separating the instruments by means of acoustic partitions. This procedure allows the sound engineer to control the sound, but it comes at a price.

The turntable showed it exceptionally well. It did not add anything from himself, but in some subcutaneous way it conveyed the information that although the musicians were in the room together, that they played together, it lacked freshness and breath from recordings from the 1950s, when all musicians played in the same acoustic space. The recording is not dry, you can hear that reverb has been added, but this is not the same as the so-called "leaks" when the sound of one instrument is "heard" not only by its microphones but also by the microphones of other instruments.

That is why the JOHN COLTRANE’s album Blue Train sounded so natural, so light, but also dense. In a near future a new analog Kevin Gray’s remaster will be released by Blue Note, but I am still playing it from the 2008 remaster, which was prepared by the same engineer, but for the Analogue Productions, and released on two 45 rpm records.

Originally released in January 1958 and recorded by Rudy Van Gelder in his studio in Hackensack, it is the opposite of Jordan's album. In the sense that it might not be that dynamic - it's a classic tape recording after all - but it's much more emotionally balanced. It means that you can hear that the instruments really played together, that although the whole thing had reverberation, there was a common space underneath.

Again, WoWo showed this change perfectly. Which leads to the logical conclusion: it is a very resolving device. A conclusion that needs to be supplemented, however: resolving, but not flashy. The instruments have a nice, dense, slightly warm timbre with it. The sound, however, is open and dynamic. When the leader played the saxophone on the axis, the body of his instrument was large and tangible. Also Lee Morgan's trumpet was rendered in the right proportions.

The space is given so as not to blow it up, but also in such a way that we have the impression of participating in a real event. And not a live one, because the recording is not and will never be the same as a concert. This is a separate field of art. But participation in the creation, be it playing live in the studio or with a multi-track recording of rock music, as on DIRE STRAITS’ Brothers in Arms.

The nature of the turntable’s sound allowed me to play this album loud, even very loud, without any fatigue. It was with it that I heard that the turntable slightly modifies the bass, emphasizing its mid-range. Not much, but still. This is the price that must be paid for focus and energy while maintaining the velvety character of the sound. Anyway, Knopfler's vocals had a lot of volume and in the Money For Nothing it was shown in a different space than the voice of the guest star Sting.

I would even say that you could hear the joyful, hot, relaxed atmosphere that accompanied the recordings. Let me remind you that they were created on the Caribbean island of Montserrat, and Sting was recording the album The Dream Of The Blue Turtles on an island in the same archipelago. All this can be heard with the Polish turntable and, as I say, almost "felt".

Maybe because it is a design with a nice, big, full sound. Listening to it with recordings from the best labels, recorded in a unique way, it was very easy to notice. But it worked even better with recordings of, say, popular music. The organ opening the first European edition of the GEORGE MICHAEL’S Faith was large and full-bodied, and the guitar that entered immediately afterwards was not thickened, and its airy character was preserved, resulting from setting its timbre higher than usual.

It played the Out of the Blue by ELECTRIC LIGHT ORCHESTRA in an equally cool, "fun" way. It finally dawned on me that it is not necessarily a turntable-tool, but rather a pleasure-turntable. Of course, as I’ve mentioned, its sound has all the elements that belong to audiophile designs. In longer listening sessions, however, something else comes out - it is more about the pleasure of listening.

It comes from a slight emphasis on the mid-bass and from treating the attack of the sound not as a primary element, but as a secondary element to timbre. It is very fast and very dynamic. When the guitars that start the said ELO record come in, they cut as fast as a cutter. When the bass hits in the second track on It’s Over, it has mass and density. Yet it was slightly held back each time. This probably explains the remark I made earlier in this text about composure.

But when it is needed, there is punch and power. So it was with METALLICA’S Master of Puppets I'm playing this record from a 2008 remaster released by Warner Bros. Records on two 45 rpm discs. It is not an outstanding recording, but in this version and with this turntable, had the "drive", the momentum, which makes our blood flow faster and we almost feel a rush of adrenaline.

▌ Summary

THE SOUND OF THE WOWO TURNTABLE is shaped in a particular way. It focuses on the timbres, because they are well-differentiated, dense, and internally rich. These elements are emphasized though. We can hear them clearly, but we do not pay attention to them. It is similar with dynamics. It is very good, and yet we do not sit tight in the armchair, waiting hopefully for the end of the album, or at least a track, to catch a breath.

WoWo does not impose itself neither with timbre, nor dynamics, nor bandwidth extension. It presents everything in a controlled, "mature" way. It doesn't care about the type of music, pressing or release. It will show you each of these elements right away. However, it will do it by the way, and not „from the start". Knowing that we are dealing with a mature product, we will listen to any album with it in full comfort, .

When pairing it with a cartridge and our audio system, it is also worth paying attention to the fact that the upper bass and upper midrange are slightly withdrawn. This is why all records sound in such a pleasant way, but it is a concrete effect on the signal. Low bass has good energy, but we should not expect the ultimate focus from it, as from more expensive turntables or turntables presenting a more "technical" style of playing. There is nothing technical here, and yet there is everything in this sound that we value good, well-thought-out designs for. It's a very, very good turntable. ■

| About shellac records

THE TESTED TURNTABLE featured two tonearms. One of them hosted the Audio-Technica AT-Mono3/SP cartridge. It is not an expensive pickup because it costs less than PLN 900. And yet it offers an insight into the fascinating world of shellacs. It is a separate part of the audio industry, and music lovers who belong to it often think of others with sense of superiority. Why? You should listen to some shellacs on the WoWo turntable and you will to some extent understand what they mean.

The music played from these albums has an incredible, unbelievable naturalness. Although the bandwidth is clearly limited, it is not perceived by us in a conscious way. The intensity, energy, "presence" are finally incomparable with almost anything else, which we deal with today. Part of that is due to technology. All these recordings were made directly on acetate, without the use of tape. Created in one approach, they required exceptional skills from both musicians and sound engineers.

However, this does not fully explain the fact that with such a primitive medium we get such a real sound. Louis Armstrong, Frank Sinatra, Glenn Miller or Bing Crosby never sounded like this for me. Never. You can hear with shellacs, what the natural softness of the sound is, and it is with them that I understood my choices better. As it seems, all my life I have walked this path without even realizing it.

There are a lot of problems with these discs. They are usually not in the best condition. Songs finish quickly and you have to get up every 2-3 minutes to change sides. In the middle of the record, when the music is over, they crackle mercilessly. And yet, folks, the relaxation they offer is something you won't get with any other medium. Besides, only with them you will hear most of the stars of classical, jazz, swing and vocal music of the 50s and 60s in their best roles, in the best recordings. ♦

More about shellac records → HERE