The recent popularity of suitcase turntables with fully automatic functionality has reduced the record player to a toy, a retro trinket.

They appear to cater for those too busy to put down their craft beer or curtail an anecdote about trekking to Machu Picchu in order to lift the needle, rather than the genuine hi-fi or music enthusiast.

But in the AT-LP3, Audio Technica has fashioned a turntable with all the ease of use and affordability of such suitcase record players, but one that also follows the rules of hi-fi.

We need those rules: particularly ones that tell us no matter how much technology you use to make things simpler for the listener, it should never steal the spotlight away from the performance.