"Brilliantly Listenable"
After the first impressive and highly acclaimed model Forte turntable, the European Audio Team follows with the small brother, dubbed EAT Forte S. The letter "S" is for "small." However, there is nothing small about this turntable, so we'll take EAT at its word that they are having a bit of a joke with this name. As always, EAT is deadly serious about creating a high-end turntable at a "small" price considering the level of performance on hand.
With the Forte S, EAT reduced size of the huge platter from the 15.75" to 14.2" and trimmed down the weight from 44 lbs. to a somewhat more svelte but still formidably heavy 33 lbs. Performance remains amazing. The idea behind the slightly smaller platter is to keep as much of the effective moving mass as possible on the outer edge of the radius. EAT calls the net result of controlling the distribution of mass in this way: "Double size of diameter and four times more effective sound."
The platter incorporates sorbothane damping on the inner side and on the outer side black damping matt produced from recycled vinyl. The end effect is a completely quiet platter. Sophisticated inverted bearing construction with a ceramic ball on the top faces the Teflon material. The pressure on the ceramic ball is reduced by two enormous neodymium magnets that are suspending the heavy platter and which take over most of the load.
This version of the EAT Forte S turntable comes with the new C-Note tonearm and may be ordered with an optional EAT Jo No. 5 MC phono cartridge, EAT Jo No. 8 MC phono cartridge, or Ortofon A95 cartridge MC cartridge.
"Best Multimedia" Award-Winner
"Old-fashioned acoustic excellence," declares Esquire magazine, which honored the Forte S with a "Best Multimedia" award in December 2010. "This polished paean to vinyl is the latest design to emerge from the eminent European Audio Team (EAT). Accurate snap and crackle is assured via a dampened 15 kg aluminum platter and floating magnetic turntable, in a choice of two high-gloss finishes."
"A brilliantly listenable bit of kit," notes Hi-fi World magazine. "The Forte S is fast and lucid, but focuses on stringing everything together rather than excelling in our particular respect."
Dual Motor Design
The original model "big brother" Forte turntable has two motors built into a separate chassis that contribute to its imposing 27.6" width. EAT Forte S is "only" 21.7" wide and uses single-piece rather than dual-chassis construction. Nevertheless, the Forte S also has two AC motors. They are symmetrically positioned on the right side adjacent to the platter. Therefore, you do not need two belts of different lengths, as you do with the "big brother" EAT Forte. Operating the motor from the display panel is a cinch, thanks to three available settings: 33.3 rpm, 45 rpm, and on/off.
Both the original-model Forte and the Forte S turntables are mass-loaded with huge magnetic feet, which act as a sub-chassis. Forte S uses four magnetic feet that allow height adjustability. This brings impressive low and excellently damped resonance to the entire system. Vibration distortions have no meaning at all for Forte S or his bigger brother.
EAT Forte S measures 21.7" × 17.7" × 9.8". The total weight of the complete turntable including the platter is 97 lbs. It is available in gorgeous finish options: high gloss piano black or high gloss Makassar (ebony wood).
C-Note Tonearm
The C-Note tonearm is a completely new design which combines all advantages of an uni-pivot arm with a Cardan design. The uni-pivot in the middle only helps bearing to be less loaded. The traditional Cardan bearing insures high stabilty and easiness of use with very low friction. Also inside the tonearm is a special silicon-based grease to damp the tonearm / cartridge resonances by more than 50 percent. The tube is constructed from carbon and is super stiff and rigid.
EAT made the head shell out of special light and rigid aluminum to get the perfect combination of the advantages of carbon with better inner damping of the aluminum as well as the possibility of tighter mounting of high-end MC cartridges.
Optional EAT Jo No. 8 MC Phono Cartridge
The E.A.T. Jo No. 8 high-end performance moving-coil cartridge will extract more music from the groove than you previously imagined.
In 2018, E.A.T.'s Jo No. 5 moving-coil cartridge raised the bar for affordable transducers capable of high-end performance. Reviewers around the world acknowledged that it was remarkable for a cartridge at its price point. But, they mused, what would E.A.T. deliver with no price constraints?
Now we have the answer! According to founder and CEO Jozefina Lichtenegger, "Jo No. 8 was created because of the demand to go one step further. Customers and distributors concurred that the design was an obvious candidate for more exclusive components, an even more carefully conducted, higher level of selection and – ultimately – a superlative, but inevitably more costly and exclusive precision-made body. We knew that this recipe would result in a wonderful-sounding transducer."
The Transducer is Key
Use of the word "transducer" is the key to understanding the demands of the design criteria, with the recognition that a cartridge is just such a device. A phono cartridge is an electromechanical transducer that converts mechanical information into an electrical signal, working in exactly the opposite manner of a loudspeaker. This conversion is the most important element in an audio chain, because any distortion or non-linearity in the amplification is ten times less than what occurs at the speakers or via the cartridge.
Highest Quality Materials
For the serious music listener, any increase in an investment in a fine cartridge is worthwhile. The benefits include the reduction of distortion to a minimum and the achievement of a perfectly flat frequency response. Accomplishing both is extremely demanding, requiring the utmost attention to detail, abetted by the use of only the highest quality materials. And these are exactly what E.A.T. uses in the remarkable Jo No. 8.
Working in Perfect Harmony
No-compromise materials and components are not enough unless the designer understands how to apply them in combination. The stylus, the cantilever, the bearing, the suspension, the "motor" and lastly, the body shell need to work together in perfect harmony. To elevate the already-exceptional performance of the No. 5, E.A.T. has employed for the No. 8 a nude Shibata stylus on a boron cantilever, contained in a matte-finished wooden body made of solid chestnut.
