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You don’t need to be an audiophile to get into the charm of vinyl records, and you certainly don’t need to go bankrupt doing it. The notion is something that UK audio makers Mixx is banking on with its new Revival 55, a retro-styled all-in-one record player in a suitcase the company unveiled today that’s perfect for vinyl newcomers or casual spinners, and costs an easy $100.
The compact record player is all about retro style, coming in black, cream, green, pink, and turquoise pastel colors, all wrapped in a protective PU (polyurethane) leather. Its chrome-plated buckles add some extra nostalgia to the design, and snap the lid shut making it easy to tote the diminutive player around.
Under the hood, the Revival 55 is a belt-driven turntable for the quietest operation possible, and while the build is mostly plastic, it has all the features a beginner spinner needs. The Revival 55 includes built-in speakers, an auto-stop feature that turns the player off at the end of a record (to preserve both the needle and your records), speed control for 33 1/3, 45, and 78 RPM vinyl, and a mechanical tone-arm lever for gently raising and lowering the needle on and off your records.
The Mixx Revival 55 also has a bunch of features you don’t see too often, even on some of the best turntables available, such as a pitch control dial for having fun speeding up or slowing down songs, and two-way Bluetooth connectivity so you can not only play records wirelessly through your Bluetooth speakers, but also stream music from your smartphone and music streaming apps like Spotify or Apple Music to the record player, too.
Additionally, you can also use the Revival 55’s AUX input to connect wired sourced to the player, or use its line level output to connect to an amplifier or a set of powered speakers for even bigger sound.
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The Mixx Revival 55 is an “all-in-one solution for enjoying music, whether from a physical vinyl collection or streamed digitally,” Mixx says in its press release, and while sound nerds and audiophiles need not apply, for its $100 price, it could be an excellent entry point for anyone looking to have fun with vinyl records.
The Mixx Revival 55 is available now on Amazon.
Derek Malcolm is a contributing editor and evergreen lead for the A/V and Home Theater section of Digital Trends. Derek…
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A photograph of Thomas Edison with his second phonograph in 1878. Levin Corbin Handy/Public Domain
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