***The cartridge is fine. I haven't checked the speed yet. What would I need to check the speed?***
As a VPI Aries II owner, I concur with the other suggestions made about checking the speed of your turntable. For what it's worth, I've found the following to be excellent upgrades to my Aries: SDS and Ginkgo Cloud 11 isolation platform. The SDS really is critical for best performance on VPI tables. The Dynavector Karat 17d2 cartridge seems to match very well with this rig.
Good luck!
As a VPI Aries II owner, I concur with the other suggestions made about checking the speed of your turntable. For what it's worth, I've found the following to be excellent upgrades to my Aries: SDS and Ginkgo Cloud 11 isolation platform. The SDS really is critical for best performance on VPI tables. The Dynavector Karat 17d2 cartridge seems to match very well with this rig.
Good luck!