REALLY bad day for underground music...

[rwa]

"The DJing community and the greater dance music scene mourns the loss of a clubbing staple today. No, Steve Aoki hasn’t hung up his record bag, but rather news has emerged that iconic turntable manufacturers Technics will be stopping production on their universally loved Technics 1200s and Technics 1210s.

In a statement re-posted on dance board Global Hardstyle, the company behind the production of the Technics turntables Panasonic announced that they would cease the manufacture of Tehcnics turntables in February next year, citing an increasing decline in sales as the motivation behind the line’s demise.

The Australian arm of Panasonic issued a similar statement today, expressing their disappointment that the brand’s 35 years-and-running legacy was to be put to bed.

“It is a sad day today but due to low sales globally in analogue turntables a decision to stop production has been made on Technics Turntables,” Panasonic spokesman Ian North explained. “For Australia this means we will receive our last shipment in March.”

With the disappearance of Technics decks now imminent it’s becoming increasingly clear that the digital juggernaut is showing no signs of slowing down. We’ve already heard from trance icon Tiesto how he’s abandoned the ‘outdated’ medium in favour and gone for the ease and accessibility of digital tune libraries. Indeed, the new (and might we just say super-sexy) CDJ-2000s from Pioneer look to be making things easier than ever before with USB stick functionality, employed just last weekend by another digital convert Sasha.

Whilst we’re sure the classic Technics turntables will live on in the hearts of many club-reverent folk out there – not to mention in more than a few purist clubs – it’s still a crushing blow to lose the decks, and if nobody minds, we’ll be bringing beer o’clock around early this Friday afternoon."

[Matrix]

That truly is bad news...........I wonder if some other company would buy the rights and manufacture tooling to make them under a different brand.  But as most of you have had your 1210's and never had any problems, im sure that's the reason why the demand is dropping.  They have made a good quality product, maybe if they had made them a little less robust people would be buying replacements every 5 years or so 

[evil0r_than_sk3l3t0r]

i cant see anyone taking it over if they are making a loss ..thats terrible news and possibly the death of vinyl .also beggers the question wtf are turntableists going to do

[Matrix]

Ebay and pay over the top prices

[shamrock08]

Sorrow... 

[evil0r_than_sk3l3t0r]

Ebay and pay over the top prices

goes off to pack my decks up to flog them in 5 yrs time \o/

[rwa]

Of course you are right matrix, they are sinply too good! which is not really in line with a capitalist economy which promotes limited lifespan of product or innovation, but as it was impossible to improve on perfection, the innovation aspect wasn't necessary. It's a shame that such agreat product is gonna go the way of Concorde simply because its no longer economically viable. 1210's are a work of art, not joking. I'll buy yours off you skeletor, they are worth whatever price you ask.

[evil0r_than_sk3l3t0r]

panic over

Clarification came from Panasonic UK to squash rumours. And It’s not what you might think. So here goes – the 1200MK5 and 1210MK5 WILL be discontinued leaving the 1210MK5G as the top of the range and most definitely NOT discontinued. It never was a limited edition, just a flagship special edition model. And the 1200 and 1210 MK2 will continue as normal. So now there’s some distance between the MK2 and MK5G models instead having a middle MK5 deck to confuse matters. So it’s vanilla Technics or the more expensive piano black extra pitched blue light luxury model left in the range.

that means my mk5's will be sought after ..niceee

seems a wierd move though i would of thought the mk2's would of been the ones to be discontinued ,shrugs
goes off to give me dex a hug

[shamrock08]

Yeah, I have seen that exact line about 10 times now. Better to be safe than sorry and do a "Eddie Flashin Fowlkes" on some retailer or warehouse....

[Morse]

i cant see anyone taking it over if they are making a loss ..thats terrible news and possibly the death of vinyl .also beggers the question wtf are turntableists going to do

I think you're overreacting a bit Technics Sl 1200/1210 turntables are undeniably and iconic in the clubscene over 30 years there's quite a lot of quality decks out there. I'm not dissing it (i dont know a single DJ out there who hasnt at one time or another in his/her career used them) and their 'hard as nails' reputation is well founded but  incarnations after the SL1200/1210MkII (MkIII, Mk5, Mk5G etc) kept a steady (and dare i say it) expensive price tag, and offered bugger all in terms of enhanced/improved functionality, apart from non click pitch fader....
http://www.panasonic.com/CONSUMER_ELECTRONICS/TECHNICS_DJ/compare_analog.asp

...Whereas turntables such as the ugly but excellent  Vestax PDX D3 (pitch bend higher torque digital pitch control =/- 12% )
and Numark's TT200 (reverse, higher torque,straight/s tone arm), TT500 (8, 10, 20, 50% pitch, 4.7kg torque, instant reverse, redesigned chassis REMOVABLE CABLES), TTUSB (usb connectivity for vinyl ripping) and TTXUSB (variable Torque, Key Loclk, line/Spdif connectivity,usb connectivity)
(I cant speak for stanton used a pair once and vowed never again)

Continuously raised the bar from 1998 to now with a host of improvements, while Technics rested oin its cred and sat on its arse (not to put too fine a point on it) otherwise some of the larger clubs in London for example wouldnt have replaced the 1200 for the PDX D3 in 1999, then for the TTX1 in 2004.

Bottom line: yeah its a damn sad thing to see the SL 1200/1210 go, its the end of an era for a lot of us, DJs 10 years from now probably wont know what that deck was apart from an old relic, which is heartbreaking, but its not the end of vinyl or the end of turntablism, or the vinyl based DJ. theres a lot of great decks out there, dont confine yourself to SL1200 just cos of its legacy