High End MC Cartidge purchase.
- Thread starter badger748
- Start date
dadgad
pfm Member
Another one to add to your list is the AudioTechnica ART-1000. It's like a moving coil version of the Decca cartridges, with the coils on the stylus end of the cantilever. Worth a listen as it is taking a totally different approach to everything else on the market, and its made by a pretty sensible and well regarded company...
https://www.the-ear.net/review-hardware/audio-technica-art1000-moving-coil-cartridge
https://www.the-ear.net/review-hardware/audio-technica-art1000-moving-coil-cartridge
Amber Audio
This is the Day
That's the cart I'm aiming for on SL-1000R some ways in the future
Would you not want to be using that only inside a micro-electronics cleanroom? (I am unsure how you'd get records clean enough to get inside as well.)
badger748
Former bacon enthusiast
Miyajima Labs Madake! You know you want too...
Yes........but............!
david ellwood
Kirabosi Kognoscente
For a man of limited funds such as myself it’s also important to factor in the cost of replacement.
A Lyra can be rebuilt at reasonable cost. Others on this list cannot, so the value of the dead cartridge for exchange is worth taking into account.
A Lyra can be rebuilt at reasonable cost. Others on this list cannot, so the value of the dead cartridge for exchange is worth taking into account.
ZYX offers the same exchange and rebuild service as Lyra...
Shuggie
Trade: Ammonite Audio
Not a new idea at all, but one first used by JVC in the early 1980s, with the MC-10
http://www.thevintageknob.org/jvc-MC-L10.html
daytona600
Registered User
AT outside coils been done before Ikeda / Neumann
DST62 from Neumann in the 1960s they only made 900 & only supplied with a cutting lathe to check lacquers
modern new versions are $10,000
DST62 from Neumann in the 1960s they only made 900 & only supplied with a cutting lathe to check lacquers
modern new versions are $10,000
I ran a DV XV1s for a while. Always regretted selling it . Must have been mad actually .
Whatever other adjective I would have used to describe it, polite would not have been my choice. I don’t know anything about the rest of your kit so maybe that’s a factor?
I found it magnificent and frankly nigh on perfect. Incredible attack, detail and soundstage . Impossibly good tracking.
The only time I ever ran a Lyra I found it a bit thin sounding, but to be fair I was using Naim amplification at the time .
I guess there’s only one way to find out ! Enjoy
Whatever other adjective I would have used to describe it, polite would not have been my choice. I don’t know anything about the rest of your kit so maybe that’s a factor?
I found it magnificent and frankly nigh on perfect. Incredible attack, detail and soundstage . Impossibly good tracking.
The only time I ever ran a Lyra I found it a bit thin sounding, but to be fair I was using Naim amplification at the time .
I guess there’s only one way to find out ! Enjoy
I used an XV1-s back in the late 2000s and on a Thales Simplicity tonearm. It was a very good combination but when you compare the cartridge with an Ortofon A95, a Miyajima Labs Madake or a Transfiguration Proteus, the XV-1s does sound a little polite. It's not that the XV-1s isn't good, its a great cartridge but the others mentioned just bring a little more excitement to the party. Transfiguration: one of the biggest tragedies in Audio IMO...
AT outside coils been done before Ikeda / Neumann DST62 from Neumann in the 1960s they only made 900 & only supplied with a cutting lathe to check lacquers modern new versions are $10,000
Not open and exposed like this:
pure sound
Trade: manufacturer/distributor
Hana Umami Red or at a higher price Etsuro Urushi. You're welcome to try either at home in your system. PM me if interested.
EU and Umami
EU and Umami
crimsondonkey
pfm Member
Someone beat me to it. What I can add is that I have one of these on the end of a Bergmann Sindre turntable wand/ linear arm. It replaced a Lyra Titan i and was chosen after listening to ZYX and a few other flagship carts that were appropriate to the compliance of the arm.
First thing to say is that the music it produces is quite fabulous and has dynamics to die for. It is the best cartridge I've had and heard by a reasonable enough margin to be sure.
Is it fragile? - not that I know of. The Sindre's arm is not damped so you have to control the rate of descent manually with a dial, but its certainly shown no signs of wear or being any more fragile or easy to damage than many other carts I've owned (the naked cantilever on the Lyra can be risky in some settings like any other).
Is it a dust magnet? - err no. I don't have a dust cover for the Bergmann and I live in a house with dogs and cats who aren't totally excluded from my listening room.I do clean my records regularly and wouldn't put a dirty/ dusty record on (that deck anyway!).
If you're in the market for an end game cartridge I can only recommend you get a listen for yourself. It is incredibly capable, but whether it matches your kit and suits your listening tastes only you can decide. Nice problem to have.
I'd like to diverge a bit on this if you don't mind? It's just is something I've seen often, something I've been guilty of and I'm not sure it makes sense.
I'm not commenting on or criticizing your choice of spending that much on a cartridge. Cost and value is relative and many people could just as easily criticize spending a tenth of that on a record player part.
It's setting a price range for components and behaving as though there are reasons to believe that components in that price range are of comparative performance. And can be assumed to be superior to cheaper components of the same type. Logically, I can't see any foundation for this.
Cartridges for instance. There are different technologies used in different cartridge designs. The companies making them will differ in how efficient their production is, the profit margins they apply and how effectively their chosen design works.
In any technology, there is also going to be a limit to what is possible. Many super-expensive cartridges boast exotic materials in their bodies or working parts when their is little technical reason to believe they should perform better than...plastic and aluminium.
You rarely see comparisons of cartridges at wildly differing price points and Hi-Fi shops tend to be careful in limiting options offered to those within your stated budget. But I've seen many forum threads, have enough experience and know friends with turntables and in the real world there is often little correlation between cartridge cost and preference.
I think we often impute higher price components with exaggerated virtues straight out of the box. I know a guy who doesn't use his Koetsu because he prefers a cartridge that cost a lot less. But how many people do that honest comparison?
Amber Audio
This is the Day
Thanks for posting your thoughts, with a bit of luck I'll be able to hear one myself in the not to distant future.