The questions people actually ask.

It depends on the model, and it is the first thing worth settling. A turntable on its own makes almost no sound.

Two of ours are supplied with their own speakers — the S20 and the A30. You plug them into the wall, put a record on, and that is the whole of it. Nothing else to buy, nothing else to understand.

The other three need something to play through. The T50 and the C40 have an RCA output and a Bluetooth transmitter, so they will feed an amplifier, a pair of powered speakers, a soundbar with a line input, or a Bluetooth speaker. On the L10 the manufacturer has not confirmed what comes out of the back, and until they do, our page says so rather than guessing.

If you own nothing at all, buy one of the two with speakers. If you already own something, buying the deck without speakers puts your money into the deck instead of duplicating what you have.

On the S20 and the A30, nothing. They arrive complete.

On the others: powered speakers from around £60, or an amplifier you may already own. That is a real cost and it is worth working out before you choose the turntable, not after — it is the single most common way people end up disappointed on the first evening.

Beyond that, records. New LPs in the UK run £20 to £30, and second-hand is not the bargain it once was. We would rather you knew that before you order than after.

You do not need to know anything about turntables. You need to know two things about the person.

One: have they got anything to play it through? If there is no hi-fi in the room it will live in, choose one supplied with its own speakers. A turntable with no speakers, given to somebody with no amplifier, makes no sound on the morning it is opened.

Two: do they already own records? If they have inherited a collection they care about, that is worth telling us, because it changes which deck we would point you at.

Tell us those two things and we will tell you which one to get. If the cheaper one is the right answer, that is what we will say.

Playing a record wears it, a little, every time. Nothing changes that, and anyone who tells you otherwise is selling something.

What differs between turntables is how fast. The number that decides it is tracking force — how hard the stylus presses into the groove. A moving magnet cartridge sits around 1.5 to 2.5 grams. A ceramic one presses at roughly 5 to 7. The higher figure flattens the groove walls faster, and that wear does not come back on any turntable afterwards.

Setup matters as much as the cartridge. An arm that is not balanced, or a cartridge seated at the wrong angle, does more harm than a modest difference in price. It is worth checking both when a deck arrives, and it is worth knowing that a cartridge you can replace is the one that lets you put it right later.

It is the cheaper of the two common types. It is simpler, it is louder, it needs less to drive it, and it presses harder on the record — roughly 5 to 7 grams against 1.5 to 2.5 for a moving magnet. It is what sits inside most portable and all-in-one record players.

Where our five stand, honestly: the T50 and the C40 carry a named Audio-Technica AT-3600L, which is a moving magnet with a diamond stylus you can buy anywhere. On the L10, the S20 and the A30 the manufacturer has not stated the cartridge type in writing. We have asked. Until the answer arrives, those pages say "not stated" rather than a word we would like to be true.

If you are buying for a collection that matters to you, that difference is the one to spend on.

All five play 33⅓ and 45 rpm, which covers essentially every record pressed today — albums at 33, singles and twelve-inch singles at 45.

78 rpm is the exception. Only the A30 lists it. Shellac is a genuinely different object: the groove is much wider, and a stylus cut for one does not properly fit the other. If you have inherited a box of 78s, the A30 is the only one of ours to consider, and it is worth asking us first.

On seven-inch singles, we owe you a straight answer. The A30 has a 45 rpm adaptor built in. The T50 and the C40 list 10 and 12 inch support and their makers have not confirmed whether a 7 inch adaptor is supplied — we have asked and it is not in writing yet. On the L10 and the S20 the speeds are stated but not named. Every product page carries this in the "not stated by the manufacturer" list rather than in the small print.

Ryyvo is a small online shop selling turntables to the United Kingdom. It is the trading name of Axel Herbet, a sole trader registered in France — the full details are in our Legal Notice. We are not an old hi-fi house and we are not going to pretend to be one.

Our decks are made in Guangdong, by the factories named on each product page — ELETREE, BoTo, GOKA and the OEM behind the L10. We do not rename the internals and we do not invent the numbers.

What we do that most sellers do not: publish the specification the factory actually gave us, and say so plainly where they gave us nothing. Every product page carries a list headed "not stated by the manufacturer", so you can see what is known and what is not before you buy.

A turntable produces a far weaker signal than anything else in your house, and it needs a phono stage to bring it up to normal level. The only question is ever where that phono stage sits.

• If your turntable comes with its own speakers, the phono stage is already inside. There is nothing to work out.
• If you are plugging into an amplifier, look on the back for a socket marked PHONO. If it has one, use it. If it only has LINE, AUX or CD, you need a deck with its own phono stage, or a separate phono box.
• If a turntable has a PHONO/LINE switch on the back, set it to LINE for anything except a socket marked PHONO.

Getting this one wrong is the single most common reason a new turntable sounds thin, quiet or wrong on the first evening. Each product page states what that particular deck has, and says so plainly where the manufacturer has not told us.

Because it is quieter. A record player's output sits roughly 6 to 8 decibels below a digital source. That is normal, expected, and not a fault — your turntable is not broken and it is not faulty.

Turn it up.

This catches almost everybody out in the first hour, and it is the most common reason a perfectly good turntable gets packed up and sent back. If it still sounds wrong at a matched volume, then it is worth writing to us.

A low, constant hum is almost always one of three things, in this order.

1. The earth wire. If your deck has a thin separate wire with a spade connector, it belongs on the earth terminal of your amplifier. Connected or disconnected can each fix it depending on the setup — try both before assuming anything.
2. The PHONO/LINE switch in the wrong position.
3. Something too close. Move the turntable away from the amplifier, the router and any mains adaptor.

If none of those work, tell us what you have and what you have already tried, and we will work through it with you rather than have you post a working deck back.

Usually the surface it stands on, not the turntable.

A deck on a springy floor, a wobbly shelf, or too close to the speakers will skip when somebody walks past. Put it on something solid, keep it clear of the speakers, and check it sits level — the feet are adjustable on some models.

If it skips at the same point on the same record every time, that is the record, not the deck.

Somewhere around 500 to 1,000 hours of playing, depending on the type. That is a few years for most people and rather less if you play records every evening.

A worn stylus does not simply sound duller. It starts taking the groove with it, and that damage is permanent on every record you play after it should have been changed. If you cannot remember ever replacing it, it is probably due.

On the T50 and the C40 the cartridge is a named Audio-Technica AT-3600L, so the replacement stylus is a stock item you can buy from any decent dealer for around £26. On the three where the manufacturer has not named the cartridge, we have asked for the part number, and the page says so until we have it.

It depends which one you buy, and it is worth knowing before rather than after.

A detachable headshell — on the L10 and the S20 — means the cartridge can be swapped without replacing the deck. An adjustable counterweight — on the C40 — means you set the tracking force yourself instead of accepting whatever the factory chose. An output — on the S20, the T50 and the C40 — means the speakers stop being the limit the day you want better ones.

If you expect to still be playing records in five years, those three things are worth more than any difference in finish. If you are not sure yet, the S20 is the one that leaves every door open for the least money.

We deliver across the United Kingdom, and delivery is free on every order. The expected date for your address is shown at checkout before you pay — you will never be asked to guess.

There is no minimum order and no surcharge for the Highlands or the islands. The packed weight of each turntable is on its product page, because a deck that travels with its own speakers arrives in a considerably larger carton than one that does not.

Everything is tracked. You get a dispatch email with the tracking link the moment it leaves us.

Send it back within 30 days and we will refund it. You do not have to give a reason and we will not ask you to justify it.

Two practical things. Keep the original carton — a turntable posted back loose, or in a box it does not fit, tends to arrive damaged, and that becomes a problem for both of us. And before you repack a working deck, read the two answers above about volume and hum: they account for most of the returns we see, and both take a minute to check.

Thirty days also means a turntable bought in November is still returnable well after Christmas, which is the point most gift buyers are really asking about.

Your rights as a UK consumer apply to everything you buy here, and nothing on this site reduces them. Damaged, faulty or not as described: we put it right.

Damaged in transit — photograph the outer carton and the deck before you do anything else, then send us the photographs with your order number. Do not throw the packaging away.

Something is not right — tell us what happens and what you have already tried. It saves us both a round of emails, and more often than not we can sort it in one.

It has genuinely failed — repair, replacement or refund, and we sort out the postage both ways.