MONO cartridge recommendation

Mikepaul:

I think you will be quite happy with your purchase. Should be a very good matchup as well with the phono board in your preamp which is something that is very, very important.

Just make sure that you are very careful with setup on this new cartridge as the Shibata, unlike the conical, is demanding of very precise setup to get the best from it. Very small adjustments in alignment, azimuth, VTA/SRA and VTF can reap big rewards with this kind of stylus; alternatively, a not so great setup can result in substandard sound.

If you do not have access to some good alignment hardware (I'm partial to the Mint and have a couple) like the Mint or Feickert, and do not have a lot of experience with alignment it may be worthwhile to seek out someone who has a very good protractor and is experienced in alignment to give you a hand.

The Ortofon should prove a very nice choice for you for playing both modern and vintage monos and when you wear it out you can economically improve its performance with a retip using a better cantilever as well.

Mono LP playback seems so basic it should be simple.  And yet there are multiple posts here and in other sites which suggest otherwise.

I don't pretend to have great expertise but since I own a few hundred mono LPs I've done a fair bit of reading on optimizing their playback.  From all that I've drawn two conclusions.  1. It can depend on when the LPs were produced, and 2. How deeply one gets into this may depend on how many mono LPs they own.

The mono cartridge VS mono switch/strapping (either with Y interconnects or hard wiring) a stereo cartridge may relate to how many monos one owns.  If you have only a few, does it make sense to spend the time and money in buying and setting up a mono cartridge?  To me it wouldn't.  I'd use the switch, or find a way of strapping a stereo cartridge if my preamp didn't include one.

For those who decide to buy a mono cartridge, what type should they buy?  I suggest that can be guided by when their mono records were produced.  It is not just a question of true mono VS internally strapped stereo and whether the cartridge has vertical compliance or not, it also brings up stylus size and shape.  I've offered this timeline previously -

Pre-stereo era monos (roughly '48-'57), select a 1.0 mil conical stylus.  

Early stereo era monos (roughly '58-'68), select a 0.7 mil conical stylus.  

Recent mono reissues (mid '90s to present), select a mono cartridge with a modern narrow stylus profile. 

Many early stereo LPs carried warnings against playback with mono cartridges.  I believe that was because of differences in cutter heads.  Groove dimensions have changed over the years. 

J Carr has posted that he believes the modern profile tip styli sound best with their Lyra mono cartridges. He didn't say this but I suspect it is because he auditioned with current mono reissues, produced with stereo cutting heads.  Also, the 1968 date for stereo cutter heads is not an absolute.  Hoffman identifies that date as the time when mono heads began to be phased out (it didn't happen overnight).

Similarly, if you have a number of original mono LPs and you are serious about playback quality, then you'll also need to consider playback EQ.  While the RIAA was adopted in 1955, alternate EQs were still utilized until nearly 1970 by some labels.

At least with 33 1/3 LPs we are not concerned with alternate recording speeds, as are serious 78 collectors.  That is unless of course you have LPs like the original "Kind of Blue" which had a defective tape machine utilized for the master for one side!  ;^) 

I don't have any monos dating into the 40's (earliest I own would be a copy of Ellington's "Uptown" from '53, but do have a fair number of '55-'65 monos and even for those my definite preference in terms of styli is a good line contact or microridge, 

Just too many limitations with a conical IMO. Primarily a lack of information retrieval in the midrange and an inability to render high frequencies as accurately. It's apparent even on 50's monos in my experience, regardless of groove width. 

hdm, to be clear, those dates I suggested referred to time when the record was produced, not when they were recorded.  That is why nearly all mono reissues may be better served with a modern narrow stylus profile.

Still, we listen for different things so there are no universal or absolute answers here, only guidelines.  After all, there are many experienced listeners who still enjoy conical styli even with stereo cartridges, such as the Denon 103.

So, does that mean we should be fine playing back a modern re-issue on a stereo cart, without Y-connector or Mono switch, as long as there is no extraneous vertical motion from scratches etc? (Assuming that both channels are putting out the same output, so there is no need to "sum" both channels).