What happens when you take one of the purest forms of analog audio and smash it
together with one of the world's most popular music platforms? You get this breakthrough:
the Victrola Stream Carbon - the solution to all your wireless vinyl needs.
Hi, everyone and welcome back to another round of "Chris reviews another questionable at first
but totally worth it piece of audio gear." This is the Victrola Stream Carbon and is the answer
to so many Sonos owners' prayers. With vinyl records making such an unprecedented comeback
of the past few years, it feels like everyone is jumping on the train. And working in the
showroom here at World Wide Stereo, one of the most common questions I would hear is "how can
I play my turntable to my Sonos?" What used to require a series of preamps and wireless
streamers can now be done with just one turntable. You could say that Victrola really streamlined the
process. So let's take some time to learn how the Victrola Stream is the perfect addition to
the Sonos household with a passion for vinyl. We all know Victrola is an old name. I mean,
they originally were making turntables all the way back in 1906, over a hundred years ago. Back then,
they were based out of Camden, New Jersey practically in World Wide Stereo's backyard.
Today, they are probably most well known for their more affordable turntables. But I want
to make one thing clear right now: the Victrola Stream Carbon is not a budget option. It is a
performance solution piece and for $799.99, I would hope so. We have almost everything I would
expect a turntable of this caliber to have. The unboxing experience is actually something I would
have expected from a much higher-end brand of turntable. As soon as we opened the box,
we are greeted with a QR code that prompts you to download the Victrola Stream app,
which is important for the initial setup of this turntable. We'll talk more about that
later though. We also have a quick start guide and some warranty information, a dust cover,
the turntable itself, with the platter silicone belt, and a power cable. Interestingly, the
Stream Carbon does not come with RCA cables, which many other turntables do come with. I understand
that most people will be using this wirelessly with Sonos, but it would still be nice to have
some standard RCA cables to connect it to a more traditional system. The Victrola Stream Carbon is
a belt-driven turntable with a die-cast aluminum platter and two-speed selections, 33 and 1/3
and 45 RPM. Pretty typical of most turntables in this price range. Something I did not expect was
the inclusion of an Ortofon 2M Red cartridge and stylus. This is the bread and butter cartridge.
It's reliable, sounds good, easily upgradeable, and a great value. A+ choice in my opinion. The
cartridge is pre-mounted to a removable headshell on a carbon fiber wrap tonearm. Very reminiscent
of brands like Pro-Ject. Something really cool that Victrola put extra effort into was marking on
the tone arm two locations for the counterweight to sit. The first tier is for some AudioTechnica
cartridges and the back line is for most Ortofon 2M series cartridges, completely negating the
need for a scale to balance your tone arm. Just to make sure these lines were correct though,
I got a scale out and measured for myself. It came out to about 1.7 grams which is almost
smack in the middle of what Ortofon recommends for the vertical tracking force while using a 2M
Red between 1.6 and 2 grams. There are a few more details to point out here on the Stream
Carbon. The inclusion of an anti-skate dial on the side here is one of them, which I did need
to adjust to keep the tone arm from swaying wildly inward. You also get an adapter for 45
RPM records with a nice little storage peg next to the speed selector. And finally on the front,
you have a volume knob that can control the volume of whatever Sonos speaker, or group of speakers,
it is connected to without needing to open up the Sonos app. The Stream Carbon also has a built-in
phono preamp that is always enabled by default. That means we will always have a line level out
from the RCA jacks on the back. Nice to have to connect this up to a more traditional system.
Additionally, found on the back are a ground connector, AC power in, and what's this? A RJ45
Jack for ethernet? That's not something you would normally see on a turntable. In fact, you have two
options when connecting this turntable to the internet to work with Sonos. You can use either
Wi-Fi or a hardwired connection. This actually leads perfectly into the streaming features of
the Stream Carbon. You will be bouncing back and forth between two apps here: the Victrola Stream
app for setup in selecting what Sonos device you want to play to, and the Sonos app to control your
groupings and volume levels. The setup process using the Victrola Stream app is as painless as it
could be. It asked me for my network information and then to select which Sonos piece it should
default to. The default Sonos piece is what the turntable will play to automatically as soon as
you drop the needle. You can change the default to whatever piece of Sonos you have at any time.
You also have the ability to select having your turntable automatically play and overwrite what
the Sonos piece is doing, or you can have it set to manual mode. Manual mode will have you press
and hold the volume button for one second and then it will play to the Sonos speaker you have
selected. The app also allows you to enable the RCA output while playing through Sonos
simultaneously or disabling it. And this light here on the volume knob, you can turn that off in
the app as well if you don't like it. I think you get a lot of control over how and what the Stream
Carbon plays to. If you want to play the Stream to multiple center spaces at once or through your
whole Sonos system, well then you need to hop over to the Sonos app and group them together
there. I would have liked to see the Victrola Stream as just an available source in the Sonos
app like any streaming source or line-in device, but this system works pretty well for now. I mean,
watch this. I'm going to play this turntable to the Sonos Move here without touching my phone.
That's fantastic! It works flawlessly. Much more convenient than what you would have had to have
done in the past. Let's talk about that actually and do some math. Let's say you get a turntable
for $500, a phono preamp for $90, and a Sonos Port for $450 dollars, bringing you clear over
the price point of the Stream Carbon. $1,040 for all of that versus $799 for the Stream Carbon.
Also take into account that you need to have three outlets to plug in all that stuff versus just one
for the Stream Carbon. It's clear to me which one is more convenient. But what about sound quality?
Of course all that convenience is great and all, but how good does it sound? Well, I'm happy to
report that it sounds perfectly fine. In fact, in a blind test at our Montgomeryville showroom,
most people I showed this to couldn't even tell it was wirelessly streaming to a Sonos amp and a pair
of Bowers & Wilkins bookshelf speakers instead of being plugged in. Could you get a higher
fidelity sound out of a higher end turntable and a Sonos Port? Well yeah, of course. But can you do
everything the Stream Carbon can at the price point it is? Not at all. Let's say you didn't
have a Sonos Amp and speakers though, or you want to listen to your Grateful Dead records outside.
Well, no problem; you can easily stream the Stream Carbon to literally any Sonos speaker. The Move
here is a great example of that, the larger of Sonos' portable speakers. Pair the Stream to this
and you can take your vinyl anywhere you have Wi-Fi. A true wireless stereo system could also
consist of this with two Sonos Fives or the Ones. Possibilities are endless with Sonos and this bad
boy right here. You can hook it up to your Sonos Arc, your Ray, your Beam, uh your Arc with two
Subs and two Ones as rear surrounds. Hook it up to literally any Sonos speaker. The Stream Carbon
is the ultimate value for someone who is deeply ingrained in the Sonos ecosystem and is looking
for a convenient, quality way to play the records to their system. You have upgradability with that
removable headshell in the cartridge, you have a solid tone arm with a fair amount of control,
and you have the ease of use for the automatic playback and volume control on the turntable.
If you have Sonos and you want a turntable for it, this is going to be my first recommendation
for a lot of people. Thank you for joining me for our review of Victrola's Stream Carbon Turntable
- Works with Sonos. You can learn more about this online at worldwidestereo.com or if you're in the
area, you can stop by our showrooms in Ardmore or Montgomeryville, PA. We have 60-day returns,
free shipping on all orders, and we're authorized dealers for everything we sell. If you have any
feedback or questions, leave them in the comments section down below or you could call or email
us at any time. Don't forget to subscribe to our YouTube channel and hit that notification bell to
stay updated on our latest videos. This is Chris from World Wide Stereo. Thanks for tuning in.
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