Benefit of low output moving-iron Grado ?

You don't get hum if set up right. If you have a Rega, you might get hum because the motor is not grounded. Easy enough to fix.

You might want to experiment with loading. We had a ZYX Universe that was very nice, one day the needle just decided to let go of the cantilever and that was that.

So we installed a wood-body Grado we had on hand. Its 5mV. It was also a little upfront/in your face compared to the ZYX (we are running a Triplanar which easily tracks either cartridge). However being a high output moving magnet, they are sensitive to loading. We've used 10K as a loading value in the past, and that seems to work well with this one too.

Funny thing, if the arm really *can* track the cartridge, you have it set up right and loaded right, you really don't hear big differences between many cartridges. Miss one of the caveats above though and its a different story!

IOW we're not hearing a big difference between the two cartridges other than output. Loading in this case was the key as the Triplanar was not the variable.

Cartridge loading is the act of putting a resistance (sometimes, a capacitor and a resistance) in parallel with the cartridge, such that the cartridge is driving the load.

We provided a cartridge loading strip on the back of our preamp for this purpose. Some preamps employ a second RCA connection in parallel with the input- you put the resistor on an RCA connector and plug it in.

Other preamps have a switch with preset loading positions. Still others use tiny little jacks mounted to the circuit board in the preamp.

Some phono preamps have no provision. Then you have to come up with something to make the connection.