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Recommended Component 2025 – Stereophile
Reviewers' Choice Award – SoundStage!
Reviewers Choice Award - Part-Time Audiophile
"Better Than Some Turntables Costing 3X More," Raves Michael Fremer
The Music Hall Stealth is the company's first ever direct drive turntable, and just as you would expect, it's a doozy. Stealth features a brushless low-torque motor that automatically stops running at the end of a record for maximum armchair listening convenience that few other great-sounding turntables provide. And certainly not in this price range! It also includes an aluminum tonearm with VTA that can be adjusted during record playback, which is also a unique and valuable feature at the price.
This substantial 24-pound turntable attenuates external vibrations by utilizing what vinyl playback guru Michael Fremer notes is "an unusually heavy, multi-layer and well-damped chassis as well as large, viscous-elastomer damped height-adjustable feet and a 4 pound, elastomer-damped… aluminum platter."
Music Hall waited more than 20 years before launching a direct drive turntable. It was worth the wait if you are into direct drive," Michael Fremer reports in his August 25, 2021 review for analogplanet.com. "The Stealth is a stylish, well-performing and fine sounding, moderately priced, well-damped and isolated direct drive turntable, the sound of which is limited mainly by your choice of cartridge."
"Recommended Component" Honors
Stereophile honored the Music Hall Stealth by awarding it the magazine's coveted Recommend Component status for 2025.
According toStereophile, "HR [Herb Reichert] wrote that what he noticed most with the Stealth and 2M Blue was the 'high level of tone correctness.' HR was also impressed by the tonearm, which he described as exceeding his expectations. 'During use, it felt precise and well-sorted. Its bearings felt just-right tight, and its arm-lift mechanism served me with ... ease and assurance,' he wrote. 'I can think of no record player under $2000 that I'd rather use. Or recommend.'"
"Succeeds in All Areas"
"Its features and performance are stellar. I like that it offers interchangeable headshells and an auto-stop feature, and the unique VTA adjustment is helpful. Its sound is simply top notch, and the more I hear the Ortofon 2M Blue cartridge, the more I like it," raves Thom Moon is his review for SoundStage!, which honors the Stealth with its Reviewers' Choice Award. "Simply stated, the Music Hall Stealth succeeds in all areas. You can buy it now with the assurance that you’ll probably never outgrow it."
"Most of all, though, the Stealth gave me confidence that whatever LP I put on the platter would sound as good as it was going to at the sub-$2000 price point," reports Guy Lemcoe, theaudiobeat.com, June1, 2022. "For those who get their music from the grooves of vinyl records, the purchase of a Stealth turntable could be an endpoint. It will open the door to the high-end without breaking the bank. In the right system, it can deliver 85% of the magic found in systems costing much, much more. I view it as the foundation upon which a fine system is built. Music Hall Audio and Roy Hall have hit it out of the park with this one."
Ready to Play ALL Your Records
Stealth will play ALL your records! And it's ready, right out of the box with minimums set-up. This three-speed (33-1⁄3, 45, and 78 rpm) direct drive turntable comes complete with an s-shaped tonearm, a detachable headshell, and a factory-mounted, precision aligned Ortofon 2M Blue cartridge.
Stealth boasts touch-activated speed controls for ease of use, making it ridiculously simple to go from LPs to your favorite 45s. Speaking of ease, an auto-stop feature turns off the direct-drive motor at the end of a record. So you don't need to hop up out of your chair when an LP has finished playing. You can hang onto that blissful mood as long as you like.
According to Michael Fremer, "'Tap tests' on both the stand upon which the turntable sat and on the plinth itself demonstrated that the Stealth is in that regard extremely 'stealthy' and performed better than some turntables costing 3X more. There are a few companies that try everything to achieve this performance level but never manage and always produce 'lively' plinths and far less effective isolation."
Also included with the Stealth are vibration-damping feet, a vibration-damping rubber platter mat, and a cloth dust cover.
Includes an Ortofon 2M Blue Cartridge
The Stealth comes complete with Ortofon's 2M Blue moving magnet phono cartridge, which comes pre-mounted and precision aligned. It features a new, improved engine that provides an increased output of 5.5mV, an optimized sound reproduction, and a high level of sonic accuracy. The 2M Blue adds more dynamics and resolution, sounds more open and reproduces more details than its highly popular 'little brother,' the bestselling 2M Red cartridge.
England's What Hi-fi? magazine honored the Ortofon 2M Blue by naming it as one of the ten "Best Cartridges 2020." According to the article, "This is a step up from the 2M Red in the number four slot in this list, and as such it's a little more pricey," reports Joe Svetlik. "So, sound? The Blue delivers a real sense of vitality to recordings, and brings a good sense of timing to proceedings… This is a very capable little cartridge indeed."
Elliptical Diamond Stylus and Split Pole Pins
The 2M Blue Nude boasts an elliptical diamond stylus and split pole pins with a copper wire. Split pole pins are an invention that enables moving magnet cartridges to have a flat frequency response, as with a much higher-priced moving coil cartridge. Split pole pins were invented by Ortofon, and were originally presented in the 500 series and Super OM series.
"With the 2M Blue... you get the audiophile treatment: a full-range, highly resolving presentation that sounds neither stiff nor unforgiving," raves Mark Mickelson atThe Audio Beat. "In fact, the 2M Blue's balance, both tonally and in terms of overall resolution, may be its greatest feat. It's an easy cartridge to listen to…"
Reviewers Choice Award - Part-Time Audiophile
"I really loved the Music Hall Stealth turntable. The longer I used it, the more I realized how much it shared with that Technics SL-1200G I used for more than three years. This is a workhorse ‘table at less than half the price of the Technics, it sounds fantastic, it’s amenable to tweaks and other improvements, and it has a genuine, high-end turntable sound," reports Mark Phillips, Part-Time Audiophile, February 11, 2024, which gave the Stealth a Reviewers Choice Award.
"The Stealth is a mature turntable design from someone who has spent many years releasing bang-for-the-buck analog products that appeal to so many people, and it’s clearly evident that Roy Hall wants his clients to enjoy that same great vinyl sound without all the usual bother."
