The first production Rega mount arm has been installed by
@eksiil on a Fletcher turntable with a home made extension for 12 inch arms:
https://pinkfishmedia.net/forum/thr...would-love-or-have.259175/page-9#post-4967928
Once he has had some time to get to know it I hope eksiil will post his impressions here for those who have expressed an interest in user feedback.
As promised, after a week of getting to know the Blackbird, here are my initial thoughts. This is not a caveat: first impressions bear the truest witness to change, to whatever is new or different.
If I had to pick one word to describe the difference the 12" Blackbird makes in my system, then I'd like to invent one: it "uncrowds" music. It picks out the various sounds and strands of sounds, not just spatially (which it does very well, the soundstage is high, wide & deep). It accords each of them their own place, sustains them there for their "life span", does not let other sounds encroach, even in complex, thronging passages. (This I consider distinct from keeping *instruments* apart (which the Blackbird also excels at). What I have in mind here could, with certain licence, be called "timing").
My own guess is that this "uncrowding" stems from the Blackbird's "sideways unipivot" principle (now patented, I understand). The suspension of the tone arm on threads & its only coming into lateral contact with the arm post seems to result in a revolutionary new means of vibration-management. The way I would describe the outcome is that it allows the various sounds to acquire & sustain extension (or "body") which remains in each case distinct -- & extremely vibrant, as it were. This applies, in particular, to all kinds of guitars and percussion instruments, but the cello sounds divine & my musically educated girlfriend ajudges the reproduction of the piano to be "entirely correct". Not to mention the human voice -- I've thought of my past setups as revealing, but I'm hearing lots of new lyrics. The Blackbird has tremendous bass in terms of clarity and extension, but it also injects clarity and life into the treble. Among other things, all of this benefits low-level listening. Old favourites among LPs are also getting a whole other lease of life.
This, for me, is the Blackbird's "superpower". I've never heard an arm "uncrowd" recordings nearly as well. I've had a Rega RB250, Audiomods 5, Cartridge Man Conductor, two different Hadcock 228s & a very good hand-made 13" magnesium unipivot arm from New Zealand. With the exception of the last, I've heard all on the same deck as the Blackbird -- Fletcher Omega 3 -- using the same cart -- a Music Maker III (although it was recently re-tipped and -cantilevered by Joseph Long). For full disclosure, the amp is an Audio Note OTO SE (sporting NOS Telefunken valves & Soviet military spec EL84 equivalents) & the speakers AN-J.
I've heard a number of other reasonably priced arms -- VPI, SME, AT, etc -- in various other systems & none have even come close to what I now have with the Blackbird.
I'd be reluctant to say the Blackbird "disappears", as we're playing recorded music in living rooms or man caves. What it does is let the rest of my system deliver what I expect of it (in this instance, resolution, impact, musicality) better than anything else, far better than I could reasonably expect. I'm very curious to hear what it will make of my Deccas -- though I feel the phono stage in the OTO doesn't quite agree with them (& my Croft gear, ideal for the Deccas, is currently set up in my acoustically challenged study). I'm sure it'd be even more of a good thing.
The Blackbird is, in my experience, inherently no more difficult or fiddly to set up than a unipivot or a tangential tone arm. It can be endlessly tweaked, but equally, once set up, is a breeze to use -- I've found using the thread it sports in lieu of a finger lift to be a revelation & joy to use. The Blackbird is very well made (& presented, in its flight case). It's certainly the best-looking arm I've owned -- or seen. I think a reviewer compared its shape to that of a Concorde & that agrees with my own feeling: it possesses a timeless elegance which doesn't necessarily depend on a future for validation. All the instructions are clear & easy to follow. And last but not least, @sonndek's customer care is second to none -- he literally seems to know no rest.