I respectfully disagree with Don on this. He may not be aware of the limited used tt market in Croatia.
First of all, that type of anti-skate was not just used on cheap turntables. It appears on every table in the series up to the FR-D55, and I've seen it used on other top models during that time period. The Kenwood KD-5100 comes to mind. Second, this turntable was easily as good or better than any belt drive Technics, many of which are very popular. With PLL servo speed control, the wow and flutter could easily be .03. Technics belts were .045. I've seen pics of this tt and and it looks decent to me. Yes, quartz direct drive was preferable, but the performance won't be that much less.
It's low position in the lineup was partly because it was semi-auto instead of auto, and partly being belt drive. But it shares the same tonearm and therefore will have the same basic sound as the higher models. While it may not be in the caliber of the tt's Don suggested, any of those would set you back probably $300 or more in Croatia if you could even find them.
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Yes, I'm aware that there may be a limited market there - that's why I suggested he wait for something better to come along, however long that takes. He could buy the Sansui, and it certainly will treat his records OK, while he waits for a better model to come up at a good price. It's a bonus that it comes with a spare belt.
Independent tests of the time put the cheapest belt drive Technics turntables clearly ahead of similar Sansui models, with more accurate quoted specs - those Technics models were actually very good for the price, as were the cheapest Hitachi models, for that matter. That's why I queried the Sansui spec - I doubt it would get anywhere near 0.03% - that's Linn territory, and Linns were much better than the Sansui, and were one of the very few turntables to match their stated w/f specs in tests.
I was aware that many Kenwood models used that anti-skating, but it's still not very good, in my opinion. It depends on how well the bars are finished, of course (I've seen some that were shockers for finish!), but the ones that I've seen clearly had slight, discernible tonearm horizontal friction caused as the bars slid against each other. The higher end Sansui models didn't use it, and neither did many of the earlier models. The fact that models such as the earlier SR-636 to 929 models all used the better system of bar and weight, with the bar suspended by a thin wire like Luxman, indicate that Sansui knew that the sliding bar system was inferior, so didn't use it on their better models, apart from the higher turntables in the FR series.
-Don
