MC-MM-MI CARTRIDGES . DO YOU KNOW WHICH HAS BETTER QUALITY PERFORMANCE? REALLY?

Mahler, in my opinion, no, it is not possible to generalize about the different transduction mechanisms, as regards a pecking order of what gives best SQ. All MCs are certainly not better than all MMs, to address your specific point.

@lewm  exactly, especially when you consider price.

MM and MC cartridges occupy two distinctly different markets. Buyers of MC cartridges are willing to spend much more money on a cartridge than buyers of MM cartridges. Thus, MM cartridges are a much better value. MM cartridges rule below about $1500. MI cartridges seem to straddle the two markets. I would rather have say an Ortofon 2M Black LVB than any of the low end Hana cartridges. The one huge advantage of high output cartridges is a much better signal to noise ratio which everyone will notice right away.  If you have a MM phono stage and desire to get into the highest level of performance I can not recommend the Soundsmith Voice highly enough. It makes far more sense and will be less expensive than springing for a MC phono stage and cartridge. 

@frogman Thank you for the link: I do know that musicologists regard tension and release as something written on the stave. My point was why is they can say that? Why do we all, or nearly all, recognise what the music is doing to us? That must belong to the realm of neurology, even if we don't have the foggiest idea of how.

@mijostyn After a day of experimentation yesterday, I'm of the opinion that the Sussurro MkII ES sounds different this time because it is awfully sensitive to VTA - I believe I have read that the Soundsmith OCL stylus looks a lot like an Ortofon Replicant. For the first time I'm seeing why Soundsmith cartridges are so beloved by their owners. Once I had fiddled with that, I ended up playing albums on the LP-S, Sussurro and Decca Reference. The LP-S plays them in a coolly clinical way, detailed but not necessarily involving (and this is supposed to be a relatively lush MC!). The Sussurro would be a great way of getting a non-vinyl person to see why they might try it out. It's warm, bouncy and rich, but still has nearly all the detail of the LP-S, if a bit less clarity. The Decca is somewhere between those extremes. I wish I were in a position to try The Voice and a Hyperion too. (I cannot speak about imaging or soundstage, having one ear and no ability to hear stereo.)

@rauliruegas You're right that rare live attendances at live music won't make much impression. I wonder whether the kind of performance makes a difference too? I used to go to half a dozen operas a year, so I feel I know what one ought to sound like (for that hall etc). My next door neighbour before my last move used to offer piano and chamber recitals in a purpose built space in her home, and often remarks how much she likes to listen to my hi-fi. I have very little exposure to small venue jazz, folk or vocals, so I may be less critical about those kinds of music. I suppose that at the end of it all, as long as we enjoy what we use, we should be happy. It just makes it harder to describe the sound of a cartridge to others if we don't share a reference point.

@dogberry  Good to hear. Yes, all of the more advanced stylus shapes VTA sensitive because they have a longer contact patch. You can lose the high end easily. The OCL stylus is more like the stylus Lyra uses in the Atlas. It is not quite as severe as the replicant. Soundsmith's MR stylus is much more like the reolicant, but the Replicant remains the most severe stylus on the market. The GygerS is closest. I have a new Hyperion MR, but I can not really comment on it yet. It is a little brighter than I like and I will be able to EQ it shortly. Then I will listen more carefully and comment. 

Live Opera in a great theater is an incredible experience. You can't know what the human voice can do until you hear one and it is a great example of what a great system should sound like. Close your eyes for a few minutes and imagine you are listening to a stereo. Detail the sound in your mind, a mental note. 

I might also add that from my perspective tracking performance and detail are most important. With the ability to EQ a cartridge you can modify the sound to taste. The Hyperion MR is a great example. It tracks like a bandit and is superbly detailed, but just a bit on the bright side for me. This is easy to fix. Poor detail and poor tracking can not be fixed. 

Mijostyn, You wrote, "The one huge advantage of high output cartridges is a much better signal to noise ratio which everyone will notice right away." That is actually a very complex statement, not completely correct and not completely incorrect, in my opinion. To begin with a low output cartridge will per se have a worse SN ratio when its signal reaches the first amplification stage, simply because noise due to the LP surface irregularities and etc is a fixed base affecting all types equally and signal is purely a function of the cartridge output. So LO cartridges are at a disadvantage vs HO cartridges purely as regards the ratio of S to N, because S is relatively low. But at the phono stage output, I would think the disadvantage in SN ratio is ameliorated at least to a degree (different for each of the myriad of different possible combinations of cartridge and phono stage), if the phono stage is very low in noise and I suppose if one is using a SUT to supply some voltage gain for an LOMC. Anyway, I am rarely bothered by the sense that noise is a problem with LO cartridges. What I sense when comparing let’s say a good LOMC to a good MI cartridge is that the LOMC always seems just a tad lean compared to real music and compared to what the best MI cartridges can do. With the latter on average I get a greater sense of the real. Especially on piano jazz do I sense problems with good LOMCs. Again, I have never had a $10K+ LOMC in my system, or even one costing much more than $6K.

Since LOMC cartridges tend to be low in compliance, I would guess that most of my mild dissatisfaction with even "good" ones is due to mistracking, especially on piano.  So that would be my beef with LOMC, not noise.