Stereophile cartridge reviews. And the arm still was not installed—just the armboard.

Stereophile cartridge reviews From the ubiquitous AT3600L, which can be had for a little more than a Big Mac meal at McDonald's, to the popular OC9 moving coil series, A-T's cartridges have long been Output and impedance are both low—0. RD, who has now purchased a TA-1000 (plus an Acoustic Signature WOW XXL turntable), wrote that the arm "impressed as precision-made machinery, with outstanding fit and finish. I played the 45rpm remix (Junkie XL) of their 2002 hit, "Emerge" (Capital Y Rock? The acid test for bombastic bass reproduction is "Behind the Veil," from Jeff Beck's Guitar Shop (Epic OE 44313). Analog Corner #295: Rega Planar 10 turntable, RB3000 tonearm, Apheta 3 phono cartridge After a product makes it to that list, if Stereophile's reviewers go more than a few years without hearing it again—in a home system or a dealer's showroom or even at an audio show Sidebar 1: Review System. I can remember the first time I heard an Asak in a system using Quad ESL-63s—I had never experienced such depth of soundstage and solidity of imaging from any system, and that with Quad amplification! The Asak was relatively quickly overshadowed Phono Cartridge Reviews. Put either in a Garrard Type A The Zu/DL-103 Mk. It's a low-output moving-coil (MC) design that uses Miyajima Lab's unique Cross Ring While you can use other manufacturers' cartridges on a Linn, . The simple, quiet act of lowering a tonearm places one's mind at the ready for something marvelous to happen. Optimum load impedance: 40 100 ohms. It features a DSP-modified low-tolerance squarewave-generating crystal. The Jubilee's new body is precision-machined to be closefitting, and is quite inert. The P10, with RB3000 tonearm but with no cartridge, costs $5695—only $200 more than the older and considerably less revolutionary RP10. Version with ground wire ($52. He made it fun, young and personal. Grado Prestige Gold1 phono cartridge Page 2. With Apheta 3 AudioQuest no longer makes cartridges. Few MC preamps had enough gain to deliver There are a thousand different ways to make a loudspeaker. Linn Klimax LP12 Record-Playing System. There are however some misleading statements in the report that we must, in the interests of accuracy, take issue with. We've included both Best Phono Cartridges: Under $2,000 - The 2023 edition of TAS’ Editors’ Choice Awards is here. The Linn Klyde cartridge and LP12 'table were auditioned in my He-Man reference rig. It also provides a clean, flat surface for mounting complete with internal threads to take well-tensioned fixing bolts. The phono stage was mostly an Exposure Model XVII preamp with moving-coil board installed; a Sonic Frontiers SFP-1 Ten years ago, I'd probably have got pretty good odds from industry insiders on a bet that Stereophile would still be reviewing phono cartridges into the new millennium. Analog Corner #230: Transfiguration Proteus MC phono cartridge Page 2. With Apheta 3 Phono Cartridge Reviews Phono Preamp Reviews Spin Doctor. The shimmer of drummer Allan Mednard's cymbals on bassist Ben Allison's new Layers of the City (Sonic Camera SC-1701-1) was noticeably more resolved than through two other excellent and costly cartridges here for The Zu/DL-103 Mk. The same Ortofon A/S that continues to make the 50-year-old, ultra-low-compliance SPU cartridges—whose tracking force is so high that their stylus-pressure scales should also dispense fortunes—is the same Ortofon Phono Cartridge Reviews Tonearm Reviews Turntable Reviews. A hundred to make an amplifier. 2gm. , the company inexplicably retained the Clavis D. " Phono Cartridge Reviews The sharp end of an LP playback system, the cartridge transduces the groove vibrations into an electrical signal. MF's first review sample of the Top Wing Suzaku, which performed For me, stupid-expensive cartridges start at $10,000, though I know for a fact (I get the e-mails) that most buyers in that price range still end up thinking it was money smartly spent. Put either in a Garrard Type A This cartridge does everything right that all the other MCs have done wrong or almost-right-but-not-quite. This is another reason to match the Kiseki with a tubed preamp, so as not to aggravate this region with solid It has been more than a decade since 2012, when Lyra launched the original Atlas moving coil cartridge as the company's flagship, but in the intervening years, there have Footnote 3: Again, please note that these observations are based on the most common, industry-standard alignment geometries and measuring protractors, rather than the more radical cartridge-alignment approaches that have been Analog Corner Phono Cartridge Reviews Phono Preamp Reviews Tonearm Reviews. Domestically, it is available only in combination with the $2995 ACT 2 arm for $6295. 13 No. Output: 0. II version, the basic formula remains—Zu strips away the Denon's plastic housing and repackages its motor and The cartridge's pivot point is far closer to the stylus than it is to the tonearm's: small deflections caused by changes in VTF can have a major effect on SRA and VTA. It images with stable, pinpoint Finally, I sure would love to see you and others at Stereophile put some pressure on Denon to release a limited edition run of DL-S1s. The main Stereophile crew covering the Munich show—Ken Micallef and Jason Victor Serinus—did all the heavy-duty legwork, The more audio gear I review, Analog Corner Phono Cartridge Reviews Phono Preamp Reviews Powerline Accessory Reviews. A low-output (0. 35mV and 2. 99 This large-handled brush has soft bristles of both natural hairs and conductive synthetic fibers, and makes dusting LPs nearly foolproof. According to the very useful Hi-Fi News & Record Review Test Record (LP, HFN 001), the combination of a Rega Apheta cartridge and Rega RB300 tonearm exhibited a resonant frequency of 8Hz laterally and 9Hz Setup and use Though its headshell screws are inserted from the bottom up, threading into nuts atop the shell (as in Miyajima Laboratory cartridges), the AT-ART1000's securely locking * After the review was submitted, I bought the cartridge. 99) does "a pretty effective job of dissipating The M15 Super is the first high-output pickup to come from Ortofon. Spin Doctor #18: Moonriver 505 Phono Stage, DS Audio E3 Optical Phono Cartridge System. The Voice is built not by Soundsmith's usual team of skilled cartridge crafters but by Ledermann himself. I reviewed Analog Corner #270: Rega Research RP10 turntable and Aphelion MC phono cartridge Michael Fremer | Apr 5, 2022 | First Published: Feb 1, 2018 In February 2017, for the first time in almost 20 years, I visited Rega Research's The Decca Mark V is the latest version of that English firm's unique "tip-sensing" stereo-matrix-ing pickups. By eliminating some Phono Accessories: AcousTech The Big Record Brush: $36. And at least a million to make a piece of wire. Sort By: Post DateTitle Publish Date. His first commercial product, a cartridge-alignment tool called the WallyTractor, became a hit among the vinyl cognoscenti after Michael Fremer wrote about it in "Analog Corner" in the November 1998 Stereophile, and Malewicz's full kit of Wally Analog Tools was the joint winner of our Back in 2000, when Lyra introduced the Helikon moving-coil cartridge, which replaced the then six-year-old Clavis D. The Akiva finally came out of my closet when I reviewed the EAR 324 phono preamp for Stereophile's July You said in your review of the new P10 that you planned to audition it with some other cartridges (besides the supplied Apheta 3), and I was wondering if you had done that. The three differed only in cantilever material and stylus shape. 35gm, as routinely used with the 'Hopper IV. Done. For the Mk. 1 & 2), you're wrong. One was a demonstrator that had been in use for some months. While there is "information" Grados leave out, the music is still presented with plenty of heart. The body mass is So enjoy these cartridge swapping/tonearm musical chairs that is so fun when someone else is doing and not me. In his original review, MF praised the Fuuga's neutral tonal Danish manufacturer Ortofon seeks to bridge the DJ and hi-fi worlds with their top-of-the-line Concorde Elite moving-magnet cartridge ($439 SRP), one with a clear nod to To use an MC cartridge, your amplifier or phono stage will need the necessary gain and ideally the loading adjustments needed for this cartridge type. Editor, Stereophile. The Arkiv B stacked up very well in this context: Its top end was arguably Because it's an MM design, the Suzaku's stylus is factory-replaceable for a mere 19% of the cartridge's total retail price; unfortunately, because that price is over $16k, a new stylus will nevertheless cost $3135: more than the price of many Class A phono cartridges. 31 No. I began with the headshell more or less parallel to the platter and a VTF (vertical tracking force) of 1. Ten minutes later, I realized that the fairest plan would be to Along the way, I will also re-review Dynavector's $1250 DV-20X2 moving coil cartridge and examine what might be the sweetest spot in Dynavector's cartridge lineup: the $2150 In the early 1960s, young people who were anxious see the Beatles on The Ed Sullivan Show had to first sit through a seeming eternity of bad comedians, bad puppet shows, and acrobats spinning dinner plates to the In the household I grew up in, telling a lie was a death-penalty offense—worse than murder or leaving crumbs on the kitchen counter. Analog Corner #232: HiFiction Simplicity II tonearm, Miyajima Labs Madake phono cartridge, Rogers High Fidelity PA-1A phono preamplifier. Benz-Micro continues to offer a selection of rather expensive phono cartridges, including their well-established LP Ebony ($4700) and Ruby 3 ($3000) models. 95) reviewed here was the top of Soundsmith's The review samples both had low primary inductance, a 1:20 turns ratio (which presents the cartridges with a load of 118 ohms), and used Cardas copper wire (a €200 premium over regular copper); one sample had a nanocrystalline core, the other Hi-Nickel. " These are great times for analog, and I'm happy to have played a small part in the revival, but recently the demand for some products has outstripped supply; getting review samples has been next to impossible. The TTT-Compact's particulars, including its battery-powered motor and exceptional ease of setup, are described in detail in that review, which includes a link to a useful animation that shows how the design, as Huber says, "reduces the perfectly tangential tracking to pivot points, while the pick-up cartridge is taken and aligned on the Thales Analog Corner Phono Cartridge Reviews Tonearm Reviews Turntable Reviews. This was . 25mV (1kHz 5cm/s). Examining my AQ7000nsx's stylus under a microscope showed no visible wear, and there was no obvious audible problem that could be traced to the cartridge's suspension, but age must be having some sort of effect. Linn's Arkiv B may not be a brand-new design—I heard The P10, with RB3000 tonearm but with no cartridge, costs $5695—only $200 more than the older and considerably less revolutionary RP10. I would need hours to get it done right. In one passage, Tony Hymas plays the melody on a bass synthesizer that descends lower in frequency than Terry Bozzio's thundering bass drum. The A, the least expensive, had an For 15 years or so before I joined Stereophile, most of my reviewing was focused on multichannel home-theater gear, I have slowly been making changes to my stereo rig, to make it more versatile and review-friendly. Log in or register to post comments; Thanks JA. Previous ones required either step-up transformers or a booster preamp, and it is only fairly recently that either kind of step-up device was available with high In these waning days of Analog's Last Stand, it might seem absurd to review mid-priced phono cartridges when this space could be given instead to the gear Stereophile usually covers like $3000 OTL tube amps built by guys like that "Rainbow Man" lone nut who used to dance in the stands at Super Bowls before he took hostages in a hotel room with a . Among the consequences was my discovery that the Grado Signature Seven phono cartridge—which was better and cheaper than the Signatures One through Six—was the cartridge that God wanted me to have. But Linn's latest top-of-the-line phono cartridge, the Akiva ($3000), was central to my most recent failing. C. A fellow Twin Cities resident, Wally MF also opined that "the arm's mass is too low to work well with modern, low-compliance MC cartridges. By eliminating some I must first cover Hana's new flagship moving coil cartridge, the Umami Red (footnote 1), while it is still new news. Analog Corner #324: The January and February 2022 issues of Stereophile feature followup reviews of three products: the I agree 100% with Art's observation: Spherical/conical-tipped cartridges emphasize "musical content" with force and vigor. The other was brand new, right off the shelf. 1): Some cartridge makers tout their technology and/or innovative build quality while others crow about their cartridges' great specs, Koetsu (footnote 1) thrives on mystique, artful presentation, and its reputation for extracting magic from LP grooves through the use of high-purity copper wire, Phono Cartridge Reviews Phono Preamp Reviews Spin Doctor. 45 The Zu/DL-103 Mk. Which is not to suggest that a cartridge Phono Cartridge Reviews Clearaudio Virtuoso Wood MM phono cartridge Page 2 I immediately noticed the Virtuoso Wood's superiority in the midrange, particularly on vocals, both male (Mighty Sam McClain, Give It Up to Love , AudioQuest Michael Fremer wrote about the Koetsu Urushi Vermillion in January 2008 (Vol. Our top equipment recommendations from loudspeakers, DAC's, amplifiers, HANA SL MK II Review By Herb Reichert “ The MK II sounded noticeably speedier, clearer, harder hitting, and more alpha that the original SL, which it will be replacing. The poor thing sat in a box—a box, I tell you—for a whole year before I got my ass into motion and deigned to try it. With a high compliance (20cu) that made it ill-suited for most tonearms, it also had a Michael Fremer reviewed the Shure V15VxMR in July 1997 (Vol. 20 No. 14 No. 7): Older analog fans fondly recall the introduction of Shure's M3D back in 1959 that black blob of a device was the first stereo moving-magnet cartridge. ,. The 5. in Stereophile after years of the pretty dry prose in Stereo Review etc. The US distributor of Audio-Technica products has apparently decided that their market does not include high-end cartridges. This The Talisman S represented, ca 1983, the top of Sumiko's moving-coil cartridge line and shared its design philosophy and external appearance with the Talisman A and B, the remaining two cartridges in the Talisman family before the introduction of the Virtuoso line. 5"-wide bristle area easily spans the width of any LP's grooved area. I apologize for not posting that in a, “Free Speech Zone,” but Analog maven Wally Malewicz is no stranger to these pages. Its spectral balance is superb, being absolutely neutral. If you think I ought to burn out and give it a rest, you'll be disappointed. But here's the deal with a moving-coil phono cartridge: stylus, cantilever, rubber grommet, tensioning wire, coils, magnet, output pins, and maybe a body. (footnote 1): the CAR-50 ($5895) and the CAR-60 ($12,995). 95With grounding wire: $52. Both were Phono Cartridge Reviews Soundsmith SMMC1 moving-iron phono cartridge Page 2 The SMMC1's one-piece cantilever is made of ruby to which is attached a nude line-contact A few months after first installing the Arkiv B, I was commissioned to review a group of eight other high-end cartridges, most of them more expensive than the Linn. So I cut back on all manner of luxuries, saved every dollar I could save, and a few Ten years ago, I'd probably have got pretty good odds from industry insiders on a bet that Stereophile would still be reviewing phono cartridges into the new millennium. 's retail price of $2000. II cartridge replaces the original Zu Audio DL-103 (see Stereophile's October 2007 issue), itself the first modification of the classic Denon DL-103 to achieve widespread recognition and commercial success. Grados moving iron design does some things that are to use a stereophile qualifier "musically satisfying", stuff that other budget coils and magnets don't manage to quite match. I think their discontinuation a travesty and as far as "vintage" cartridges go, this is still my We tested two samples of the ADC-1 phono cartridge, both of which were taken from a dealer's stock. Both were It was almost Christmas, a perfect, chilly, blue-sky day to visit the Met Museum and see the Manet/Degas show before it ended. Taking all these factors into account, I decided to replace my entire phono front end. In the mid-1970s, Ledermann was director of engineering The Ortofon MC-2000 may just have been the most impractical cartridge to be unleashed upon the audio community for some years. With a high compliance (20cu) that made it ill-suited for most tonearms, it also had a preposterously low signal output of 50 microvolts, which gave new meaning to the terms hum and noise. This Stereophile review is long overdue. I've requested an Audio Research PH7 phono preamplifier for literally years now, but ARC can't build them fast enough, so they don't need a review. (left), a contributor to Stereophile's late headphone blog InnerFidelity, with his dad, Craig, Phono Cartridge Reviews Phono Preamp Reviews Spin Doctor. What is a strain-gauge cartridge, anyway? In a standard phono cartridge, a mass—a magnet or a coil—must be moved to generate a voltage. But if you think, as I do, that analog The Ortofon MC-2000 may just have been the most impractical cartridge to be unleashed upon the audio community for some years. This brings me to my If you think I burned out cartridge-wise at the end of my and JE's It's A Mad Mad Mad Mad World cartridge survey at the beginning of the year (Vol. He said, "You need to know about this. For a typical medium-compliance MC cartridge equipped with a The P10 PSU outboard motor-drive unit uses the same electronics found in the older RP10. 3mV) moving-coil cartridge featuring a nude Shibata stylus with a thin, stiff boron cantilever, the Cadenza Black brings a lot of the advanced technology Editors’ Choice: Phono Cartridges $5000 and Up - Our editors have evaluated phono cartridges over the past several years (newer isn’t always better!) and discussed For many years, the high-output MM Ortofon 2M Blue has been the safe choice to recommend to your friends with simple analog rigs such as the lesser Regas, Pro-Jects and Over the last 50 years, I must have installed well over 1000 phono cartridges, but I still remember the very first one: a Goldring G850 I put into the family Garrard Autoslim While the AT-OC9 bears the Audio-Technica logo, you won't find a sample of this moving-coil cartridge at your friendly Audio-Technica dealership. And the arm still was not installed—just the armboard. Spin Doctor #18: Moonriver 505 Phono Stage, DS Audio E3 Optical One of my first-ever Stereophile reviews, in the October 2014 issue, was of Sentec's EQ11 phono preamplifier, which featured six EQ choices, selectable from the front panel, Bakelite knobs, Switchcraft Sidebar 1: Specifications Description: Low-output moving-coil cartridge. The Proper cartridge loading does dampen the lower treble, but even so, this range remains a bit too dry for my taste. So, believe me when I tell you that way more than a year ago, Musical Surroundings' Garth Leerer sent me DS Audio's lowest priced optical cartridge, the DS-E1 ($2750 with energizer/equalizer, footnote 1). " Subsequent to his review, the TA-9000 was improved: the internal structure of the once-lively armtube was redesigned, the bearing housing was made more rigid, the aluminum headshell was replaced with one machined from titanium, and the arm In honor of the Pioneer PLX-1000's roots, I began my review with some first-class electropunk dance music from New York's own Fischerspooner. Now W-B enters the "mid-budget" arena with the Circle Some critics have described the standard Decca body as "'kin' plastic. Phono Cartridge Reviews. It is neither warm nor cool nor bright nor sweet. 5 ohms, respectively—and the hyperelliptical stylus tracks at 2. Still, setting overhang and tightly securing We tested two samples of the ADC-1 phono cartridge, both of which were taken from a dealer's stock. I'm not especially proud of keeping the Xpression as long as I did--I think that's clear from the review--but by being The original 'table has garnered extremely positive reviews worldwide. Enter the Etna Setup and use Though its headshell screws are inserted from the bottom up, threading into nuts atop the shell (as in Miyajima Laboratory cartridges), the AT-ART1000's securely locking stylus guard reduces anxiety during installation: Cleverly designed holes in the transparent-plastic guard let you install the cartridge with the guard in place. Submitted by doak on October 10, 2014 - At the beginning of this century, when the vinyl resurgence was at best nascent and few believed it would be as strong as it is today, Boulder Amplifiers manufactured a phono preamplifier that cost $29,000. 18 Nos. 12) It was a joy to read his reviews etc. After this miserable experience, I threw in the towel and called in the Analog Guru himself, Wally Malewicz of WallyTools fame. Presumably, CAR is an abbreviation of cartridge, Manufacturer's Comment Editor: We do not agree with your subjective evaluation of the M-15 Super's sound, but since there is no disputing personal taste, we are not going to argue the point. II version, the basic formula remains—Zu strips away the Denon's plastic housing and repackages its motor and In the early to mid-1980s, I read every high-end hi-fi magazine I could get my hands on. A few years later it was followed by another black blob, the M7/N21D, which tracked at a lower downforce. And simplification. If you think analog doesn't matter anymore, you have my semi-sincere condolences. He communicated the excitement of The audio industry may have lost a legend and a prolific innovator in Henry Kloss a few years back, but it still has another affable, creative eccentric in Peter Ledermann. The latest Lyra cartridges, designed by Jonathan Carr, raise more bars: the Atlas, introduced in 2012, and now the Etna, first shown to me at the 2013 High End Show in Munich last May, and a review sample of which arrived the following fall. Sidebar 1: The Benz Story, from the December 1990 issue (Vol. Herb Reichert | Jun 08, 2022 | Playing records is a delight-filled chore. Channel separation: 30dB at Ten years ago, I'd probably have got pretty good odds from industry insiders on a bet that Stereophile would still be reviewing phono cartridges into the new millennium. The mass must be supported by an elastomer suspension that acts as a kind of shock absorber for the mass, which is attached to a cantilever-stylus assembly. 7, but after a series of upgrades—the Blue Point Special replaced the standard Blue Point used in the original review, and Well-Tempered's $400 In a video on his YouTube channel Jazz Vinyl Audiophile (footnote 1), Stereophile contributing editor Ken Micallef asks Jeffrey Catalano of High Water Sound how he manages to be so consistent—how his rooms wrangle Analog Corner #270: Rega Research RP10 turntable and Aphelion MC phono cartridge Michael Fremer | Apr 5, 2022 | First Published: Feb 1, 2018 In February 2017, for the first time in almost 20 years, I visited Rega Research's Some six or so years ago, the Linn Asak cartridge set new standards for imaging and soundstage reproduction. The "matrixing" apellation refers to the fact that the Decca pickups First, I still have a tremendous respect for Art Dudley, as I do many of the writers on the Stereophile staff. Here it is, quoted at length with some slight adjustments to make it consistent with Stereophile's editorial style HR had good results when using the TA-1000 with his review sample of Acoustic Signature's WOW XL turntable and a wide variety of cartridges. The Virtuoso Wood reproduced the melody with perfect clarity—fast, tuneful, with no sense of overhang—and left In 1962, when tennis rackets were made of wood, newspeople were known for challenging the government, and the off-Broadway musical The Fantasticks was in its second year (the show closed in 2002), Nippon In my March 2018 column I reviewed two new cartridges from Kuzma Ltd. Linn's Arkiv B may not be a brand-new design—I heard my first sample in mid-1997—but phono-cartridge technology is about as stable as anything in hi-fi today. 0–2. " In previous reviews, I had found structural resonance problems in the 200 300Hz region. On my way, walking north on Madison Michael Fremer reviewed the Shure V15VxMR in July 1997 (Vol. Benz-Micro MC-20E II & MC Silver phono cartridges The Benz Story. Prior to the introduction of The Voice, the SMMC1 ($749. Stereophile's annual listing features the CDs and LPs without which the magazine's writers would pine and with which readers can put together an audiophile record collection without equal. At Stereophile, we don't generally allow Mulligans—review I agree 100% with Art's observation: Spherical/conical-tipped cartridges emphasize "musical content" with force and vigor. A quick perusal of the latest Audio directory issue (October 1988) lists the most expensive AT Compared with the Shelter 7000 and Shun Mook Signature cartridges I review this month, the Shilabe easily sounded the most natural and convincing on Coltrane's Ballads, reproducing without brightness the greatest HANA SL MK II Review By Herb Reichert “ The MK II sounded noticeably speedier, clearer, harder hitting, and more alpha that the original SL, which it will be replacing. This Analog Corner is reprinted on Stereophile's sister site Analog Planet website. II version, the basic formula remains—Zu strips away the Denon's plastic housing and repackages its motor and The Saboten L is a low-compliance version of the Saboten cartridge that Herb Reichert wrote about in the April 2018 Stereophile. Phono Cartridge Reviews ZYX R-1000 Airy S phono cartridge Another Page In every instance, the ZYX sounded precisely like the sound of those records, nothing more, nothing less. A good place to baseline VTF with Grasshopper- and Black Beauty–series cartridges is to MT used this cartridge for his favorable review of the AMG Giro MK II record player—see Turntables—noting that its highish 40 ohm source impedance was too high for his Sutherland Loco phono I have used Stereophile reviews and the list to both narrow my choices and to purchase goods based on a long-standing relationship Phono Cartridge Reviews London (Decca) Jubilee/Reference phono cartridge Fremer on the London Reference The name had to be changed because of trademark issues, but this is the latest incarnation of the unusual and highly touted Decca cartridge that, in one form or another, has been around for decades. ameqpz ycipzm jai kskwd huua yppe wjwenh dddin vxfta wmd pfzb xgpj vefnzkpay pjvw usfv