The Victrola 8-in-1 Wood Record Player (The Navigator) is a great option for those who are looking for a retro flair and high quality sound. Listen to your favorite records on the go with this Victrola 8-in-1 Wood Record Player. This portable player can play just about any record format from 78s, 45s and 33 1/3 RPM vinyl records and even has a USB port that allows you to listen to digital music files from a flash drive. The built in speakers are amazingly powerful so even if you have a very large room, the sound quality will remain just as good. With its vintage style cabinet design, all of your friends will be asking where they can find one of these Victrolas for their home or office. The turntable also comes with an FM radio which makes it easy to find your favorite music while you’re cleaning or cooking dinner. It plugs into any standard wall outlet, so you don’t have to spend extra time looking for an electrical outlet and with 8 different built in speakers, the sound quality is unbeatable even at higher volumes.
So a few weeks ago I received a message from my old friend Robert. He is not an audiophile like me and don’t know anything about sound systems. So he asked me to help him to decide what to buy. This was his message:
“Hey Arthur, long time no talk! I’m considering picking up a record player with speakers that has usb functionality for my living room. I’ve never owned one before and have some questions. Are you familiar with the Victrola Nostalgic Classic Wood 8-in-1 turntable? I’m not a big audiophile and don’t know much about record players but I think it has everything that I am looking for. Let me know what you think!”
So I wanted to help my old friend and made an in-depth research…
Here is what I found out about this turntable.
Features
Victrola 8-in-1 Wood Record Player is full of great features. It’s not only for playing vinyl records, it has much more. Here is the list of its abilities
- Plays 33 1/3 rpm, 45 rpm and 78 RPM records.
- Has USB port for playing digital music files from a flash drive.
- USB port for recording your vinyl collection to MP3s.
- CD, cassette and radio.
- Bluetooth connectivity for playing music from any Bluetooth device.
- 5 color options.
- High quality sound. The speakers are dolby digital ready and has a 3.5 plug so it can be used with home theater systems, it even has an FM radio.
- The dimensions of this Victrola Turntable are 18.2 x 13.2 x 10 inches inches and it weighs 16.50 lbs.
- Headphone port and Aux-In Jack.
Design
Victrola 8-in-1 Wood Record Player has a very good design. It is small and light enough, but still well made. It has vintage style cabinet design so it looks retro and stylish at the same time. You can choose one of 5 colors for this record player: walnut finish, cherry finish, natural wood finish, mahogany finish or black color (it’s not really black). And from all these options some of them are hand painted and each one is unique with its own imperfections which makes every Victrola different than the others.
So what does my friend Robert have to say about this turntable? He bought it in Black Gloss Finish and he loves his new sound system! “I love this Victrola Turntable, it sounds great, I’ve never owned a record player before so I didn’t know what to expect. It’s amazingly easy to use and the sound quality is excellent. I hooked it up to my surround sound system in the bedroom and man does it get loud! But even at higher volumes everything still sounds perfect. The Bluetooth connectivity makes it really easy to sync with my cell phone or tablet and be able to listen to any song that I want. One of my friends came over for dinner the other day while using his speaker system and he loved how much better mine sounded!”
Personally, I really like the vintage style. It looks old-school, but the features are amazing.
Pros and Cons
In this section I will review main pros and cons.
Pros:
- Authentic design.
- Made of high quality materials.
- Good and loud sound. Has built-in speakers, but additional speakers can be connected to it.
- 3-speed record player (33 1/3 and 45, 78 rpm).
- You can play vinyls, CDs, radio and from USB stick.
- You can stream music through Bluetooth.
- 45 adaptor.
Cons:
- Headphone jack can’t be used while Bluetooth streaming.
- Short warranty period (1 year only).
- Not possible to record cassettes.
- Playing your music from blueetoth for too long (3-4 hours) disconnects speakers which can not be reconnected until turntable is restarted.
- Can’t connect to other bluetooth speakers.
Bluetooth Connection
The bluetooth connection is great. It’s very easy to connect your devices and after that you can play all the music from cell phone or tablet and listen through speakers without using any cables! What I don’t like about this turntable is, when it’s connected with Bluetooth device (phone or laptop) for more than 3-4 hours, speakers get disconnected and you need to restart the player for them to come back on.
RCA input
You can connect other speakers to this Victrola for even better sound quality. Every home theater system has an output for RCA cables, so you can actually connect your turntable with those cables and enjoy clean, pure sound with a few subwoofers (if you have them).
Speakers
Although Victrola 8-in-1 Wood Record Player has its own speakers, you can always connect additional speakers. For example if you have a home theater and want to play some music from your turntable through that system than just use RCA cables and connect it with your home theater’s output (most of them have an output for RCA cables).
Remote control
The remote control is very nice and pretty useful. It’s small, but you can still use it effectively. You can control the volume or play/pause your music and switch between controls very easily.
FM radio
The turntable also has an FM radio, but the problem is that you can’t skip stations forward or backward. It’s not possible to record radio with this Victrola so if you like listening to music and recording it on a cassette than I would recommend looking for another model which gives more freedom.
Cassette player
This Victrola has a cassette player, but unfortunately it can’t record anything. If you still have cassette tapes then you can use this model to play them, but, as I said, it’s not possible to record a cassette on this Victrola.
How to set up
Set up of this The Navigator is extremely easy! All you need to do is just open it, install the belt on the motor pulley and then make sure that all components are in their proper place. After that plug the power cord into a wall outlet and you’re ready to go.
Wooden Construction
This player is made of good quality real wood (pine I think). It makes the player more beautiful and authentic.
About Victrola Brand
Victrola, Inc. was established in 1906 and is located in Middleton, WI. They have been there since day one and are pioneers of music solutions that have helped sold millions of units globally. Their hard work has allowed them to maintain their success even decades after the introduction of cassette tapes and CD players which made radios almost obsolete.
The company name comes from Vittorio Vivario who invented the phonograph way back in 1877.
Today, Victrola is one of the largest manufacturers of home audio and Bluetooth solutions. They produce affordable turntables that look great in any setting, whether it’s a living room or a modern office.
The Navigator
This model was released on September 19th 2017 and it’s one of the latest creations from this great company. It’s an amazing piece of technology that brings the magic of vinyl to any room. The turntable feels very solid and well-built and it comes with really nice features.
Comparison
Let’s compare Victrola Navigator 8-In-1 Wood Turntable to competitors.
1. Crosley Cr2410A-TU Cruiser Turntable. This one is a very nice model, but it’s definitely not as good as Victrola Navigator 8-In-1 Wood Turntable in terms of sound quality and construction. It’s obvious that the wood was used for this product only because it looks good and for the reason that it’s a turntable for vinyl records.
2. Pyle PT260A USB Turntable with Speakers. This one is a lot more expensive than Victrola Navigator and it’s a very basic turntable. The quality of sound is lacking significantly, especially if you compare it to Victrola. Pyle PT260A also looks pretty bad and has very cheap construction compared to Victrola. It would be worth your money to spend just a little bit more than double the price of Pyle and get Victrola, which is a lot better in quality and design.
3. Jensen JTA-230 3 Speed Stereo Turntable with Speakers. This one costs just about as much as Victrola Navigator, but there are significant differences when it comes to the quality of sound and construction. For example Jensen doesn’t have any FM radio, instead of it they allow you to record vinyl music on cassettes. This is a pretty old-school feature that was abandoned by most manufacturers and people don’t use cassette tapes anymore.
In my personal opinion, I think Victrola beats competitors in every aspect of quality and price.
Conclusion and Verdict
If you are looking for a turntable that can play all kind of records and has Bluetooth streaming then Victrola The Navigator is the right choice for you. It’s very easy to install, connect it with your tech devices and start enjoying your music. A few things I don’t like about this player are that the Bluetooth doesn’t have much range and it can’t record cassettes.
My friend Robert who bought this device after I recommended it to him says that the sound quality is amazing and you can feel the music. I also asked some of my other friends who own this devices and they all said that this one has superior sound quality compared to others.
If you are looking for a turntable with Bluetooth then Victrola The Navigator won’t disappoint!
My verdict: I give 4.5 stars out of 5.
That’s it for the Victrola 8-in-1 Wood Record Player Review . Hope you enjoy reading this article and if you have any questions or suggestions feel free to leave a comment. I’m always available to help so don’t be shy! And don’t forget to share with your friends!
