<P> The phonograph is a device, invented in 1877, for the mechanical recording and reproduction of sound . In its later forms, it is also called a gramophone (as a trademark since 1887, as a generic name in the UK since 1910), or, since the 1940s, a record player . The sound vibration waveforms are recorded as corresponding physical deviations of a spiral groove engraved, etched, incised, or impressed into the surface of a rotating cylinder or disc, called a "record". To recreate the sound, the surface is similarly rotated while a playback stylus traces the groove and is therefore vibrated by it, very faintly reproducing the recorded sound . In early acoustic phonographs, the stylus vibrated a diaphragm which produced sound waves which were coupled to the open air through a flaring horn, or directly to the listener's ears through stethoscope - type earphones . </P> <P> The phonograph was invented in 1877 by Thomas Edison . While other inventors had produced devices that could record sounds, Edison's phonograph was the first to be able to reproduce the recorded sound . His phonograph originally recorded sound onto a tinfoil sheet wrapped around a rotating cylinder . A stylus responding to sound vibrations produced an up and down or hill - and - dale groove in the foil . Alexander Graham Bell's Volta Laboratory made several improvements in the 1880s, including the use of wax - coated cardboard cylinders, and a cutting stylus that moved from side to side in a zig zag groove around the record . In the 1890s, Emile Berliner initiated the transition from phonograph cylinders to flat discs with a spiral groove running from the periphery to near the center . Later improvements through the years included modifications to the turntable and its drive system, the stylus or needle, and the sound and equalization systems . </P>

When did the first record player come out