Although I now find accessories more of a distraction than an aid, certain ones continue to crop up an reassert their usefulness. Accessories Club honcho Mike Harris reminded me of the Gryphon Exorcist after I happened to mention to him the 'demagnetising CD' from Ayre that has everyone running around like a woad-wearer during an eclipse. I was aware that the Exorcist had been unavailable for a while, that customers were clamouring for it, nor that it had gone back into production.

A £100 value, the Exorcist is available in two versions: one for 'demagging' your system and one for phono cartridges. To our delight, Gryphon's Flemming Rasmussen decided to relaunch the Exorcist with a little fanfare. He's given us 12 regular Exorcists and 12 Black Exorcists (for cartridges)...to give away! Below is a simple quiz, but first, a re-cap.

Gryphon developed the Exorcist for easy demagnetising of the signal path in whole systems, and developed the cartridge demagnetiser in the same case. Feeding certain types of signals through a system for a fixed period of time would, in effect, tighten up a circuit, rid a system of unwanted magnetic and electronic properties and - even better - help to speed up the burn-in process of new components. As the heart of most cartridges is a magnet or magnets, demagnetising helps to focus the magnet's flux and remove unwanted magnetism from the iron core or other metal parts. Black Exorcist looks nearly identical to the original Exorcist in that both are housed in perfectly-finished metal extrusions sized like a hand-held remote. Each measures 70x48x22, both are black and they carry the instructions on their upper surface, with slight differences for either type Exorcist.

At the top end are two phono sockets and, for the Black Exorcist, a red tell-tale LED which glows during the demagnetising process as it's silent in operation. On the top plate above the text, there's a tiny toggle switch marked 'engage'. Unscrew the bottom plates for access to the 9V battery which powers the units. The reason I stress the similarity is to avoid disasters: if you own both and they're sitting side-by-side on a shelf and you're four drinks into the evening, you could all-too-easily pick up the wrong device. On a cautionary note, Gryphon warns that YOU MUST NOT feed Black Exorcist's signal into a pre-amp input. You have been warned. So always look for the red LED on top...

The regular Exorcist treats the path from pre-amp input to speaker: you plug it onto a line socket, switch on, set the pre-amp's level as per the instructions and let the signal do its work until fade-out, after approximately 35 seconds.

To treat your cartridge to a form of transducer colonic, connect the tonearm cables to the Black Exorcist and switch it on. That's it. The LED stays illuminated for 8-12 seconds, including the slow fade. When the light goes out, you're ready to rock. Gryphon reckons that heavy vinyl users demag their cartridges once a month, while casual LP listeners should do it twice a year. Another thing: Gryphon suggests that the demagnetising process take place with the stylus resting on the record. Not rotating, of course. This device restores the magnetic properties of your cartridge to a near-new state. As for full system demagnetising - once a month is a minimum.

Regular 'de-magnetisers' swear by it. Now here's a chance for two dozen of you to find out for free. To win an Exorcist, please answer this simple question:

A gryphon (or griffin) is a cross between:
a) A lion and an eagle
b) A giraffe and a platypus
c) A rabbit and a Rottweiler

The first 24 correct entries will be send Exorcists; please specify preference of regular or phono type and we will try to satisfy requests, supplies allowing.

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Exorcist Competition
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