What is the “World’s Best Cartridge”?

@dover 😂

It all depends on how you look at it.

There are many fine sounding cartridges out there but there are certain criteria that to my way of thinking have to be met before considering the sonic characteristics of a cartridge. The first and most important is tracking ability. If a cartridge can not track everything I throw at it it is worthless to me. A cartridge has to track better than 80um or I am not interested. Thus, the Etsuro Gold is not a cartridge I would ever look at and I have just spent $35,000 on cartridges meaning it is not a financial issue.  From a technical perspective the new MC Diamond is going to be a more accurate performer and it can handle 80 um. Technology trumps artisanship when it comes to phonograph cartridges but, you have to understand the Japanese mentality when it comes to issues like cutting blades and phonograph cartridges which are endowed with the unique spirit of their creator. It is spiritual. 

The next important issue is the stylus. It has to be a fine line design of the highest quality. Each type of stylus has significant variations in quality even within the same manufacturer. I am beginning to think from what I have seen so far is that the styluses of the more expensive cartridges are hand selected. The better styluses with a larger contact patch are the ones that are really quiet because they glide over small imperfections other styluses with smaller contact patches fall into. 

What I find more interesting is how much these cartridges actually sound alike than different.  

You would have to be out of your mind to buy a Decca cartridge. They are not very popular for a good reason.

There is only one accurate. Everything else is not, euphonic or not.

From Mono and Stereo 2022 talking about the DaVa, "a unique sound with startling realism." 

There is only one realistic sound. Everything else including "unique" is not. I have not listened to the DaVa Reference and probably never will. I find it's design clashes with my own perception of physics. I have listened to DS cartridges and did not find them exceptional, exceptional enough to get invested in the electronics.   However this was not in my own system but in systems that were significantly inferior. I have listened to the Soundsmith Strain Gauge and it was very enticing, a little too enticing which I think was due to it's inherent brightness. In the end I decided not to buy one. It also has trouble contending with higher groove.  velocities. 

Another point that I would like to make is that you have to be very suspicious of any component that stands out sonically in dramatic fashion. It is likely to be very colored, not realistic but surrealistic. I have gone down that road in the past and in every case tired of the sound with more experience. 

There is a huge amount of science behind the very best cartridges, materials science in particular. It takes a lot of horsepower in a company to develop these tiny parts and put them together with perfect precision. It should be no surprise that companies like Ortofon, Lyra and MSL (and all it's offshoots) make wonderful cartridges in a very reliable fashion. IMHE exotic designs wind up disappointing in the end. High resolution digital files of modern digitally recorded music do not lie. The very best cartridges should sound just like them. Any variation signifies coloration be it euphonic or not. The MSL Platinum Signature is certainly very close. 

@rauliruegas , trust me on this one my friend.  If you think the FM Acoustics equalizers are something else wait till you get a load of the new DEQX digital preamps. Their capability far exceeds the FM acoustics even if the build quality is not quite up there with FM. It is still very impressive and being able to adjust the frequency response and time align individual channels on Hz at a time is powerful in a way that in a way that defies description. 

I am working on setting up the system for digital RIAA EQ. All the parts are in place I just have to learn how to program the Lynx Hilo to send everything where it supposed to go and there is so much in that little box that my old brain is having difficulty avoiding confusion.

@mikelavigne , I'm sorry Mike but your Studers are a poor reference. The right reference is live music. Granted, it is hard to AB with live music but, live music where you are listening to the actual instruments and not a PA system is the reference. I have noted that you like the DaVa cartridge. Based on what I can determine it is not a cartridge I would care to even listen too. Maybe it is my loss. So be it. Frankly I doubt it. Not knowing you personally, I have no reason to trust your ears. I have noted your opinion and will combine that with the opinion of others. 

@rauliruegas , We shall see how the DS holds up in the long run. It is a large investment and not one I am ready to make...yet. 

@rauliruegas , thank you for saying that first. If I have to use a standard to AB against it will be a 24/192 digital file. Nothing at this date is more accurate than a 24/192 file in a home system. Why not DSD? None of the modern four channel digital processors I know of operate in DSD, always PCM. The digital program I use to play files converts DSD to PCM for playback and storage.

No analog tape machine can compete for accuracy with a 24/192 file. This says nothing about perceived sound quality. I intentionally juggle the frequency response curve to suit my own taste, intentionally inaccurate. 

What Mike's Studers are, are very cool machines, mechanical artwork. They are antiques and have no place in a modern system. They are now much more cost effective better performing ways to have the highest quality sources.  

Today I had the experience of using the Platinum Signature played through a current mode phono stage without RIAA correction, digitized, pops removed and RIAA correction applied digitally. I would call the results majestic.  With this cartridge the current mode is noticeably better than the voltage mode. I can switch back and forth. The current mode is slightly cleaner with sharper transients which increase detail. Higher volumes are even more comfortable. The two places the improvement is most noticeable is with pianos and bass definition. Very happy with the results. Now I have to learn how to "render" files. The system records them flat like raw photography files. If you want to play the files from and store them in a normal library they have to be "rendered" by adding RIAA correction, adjusting gain and using other added features like pop and tic removal. 

@rsf507 , Sure. You have the BMC MCCI which @lewm owns, the Sutherland Loco and Little Loco, The CH Precision that Michael Fremer uses and the Channel D Seta L Plus and Lino C 3.0. I have the Seta L Plus. I chose it because it can operate in either current or voltage mode, it has a battery power supply and it has both flat and RIAA corrected outputs. It's design aesthetic is also pleasing to me. It is a very simple, straight forward unit without a lot of unnecessary options and switches. Less is More!  It is also beautifully made. The electronics are all first class and it uses surface mount technology. All the script and logos are laser engraved into the metal. Digital RIAA correction has theoretical benefits aside from the utmost accuracy. It can also correct any curve you can think of. There must be 20 or more options.

Does anyone here remember analog cell phones? Terrible is an understatement.

There are things you can do in the digital world that are impossible to do in the analog world. Incomplete? Are you kidding me? Human brains are not near that fast. A computer can entirely remove the "pop" from a scratch and fill it in with a small section of the previous several milliseconds and you can not hear where the defect was. If I record a record digitally, scratches and all and synchronized the two, the copy and the real thing. Nobody will be able to reliably identify which version they are listening too. Nobody. 

@rsf507  , Darn, forgot to mention this one. The Seta L20 is a very rare bird. It costs $60,000. It certainly is by a long distance the quietest phono stage in existence. Otherwise, it is the very same circuit used in the Seta L Plus and should sound very much the same. It is also a very large heavy unit. I would love to hear one. But, it is probably safer that I don't:-) I would have a hard time explaining that one to the wife. A $10,000 cartridge was hard enough. I was lucky to get the motorcycle buy her.  

@noromance , totally different ballgame. The pop removal is done before the RIAA filter is applied. The filter slurs the pop waveform making it twice as long in time. Taking it out after RIAA is applied leaves a bigger hole. The Channel D pop filter also fills in the gap with a duplicate of the preceding millisecond of waveform. All this is done in the digital world and is not noticeable. It also is removing just the big pops not the little stuff. It's sensitivity is adjustable. It can also be turned on and off on the fly. I seriously doubt any of us could reliably identify when the filter is on, I can't. Remember, this is not a stand alone piece of equipment. It is only a software program. It only requires a phono stage with a flat output. Granted, there are not many of them. I can not imagine a phono stage of higher quality than the Channel D Seta L Plus. I bought one for a reason and it was not cheap either, $10K. There are certainly more expensive units but excepting Channel D's Seta L20 at $60K there are no other more expensive units that interest me at all and this is after a decade of research. The CH Precision is a large overly complicated unit that requires an outboard power supply to function at at it's best. That is nuts to me. There is no better power supply than batteries. The unit disconnects itself from the wall in operation. Less is also more. When it comes to phono stages a lot more. 

In my own world objectivity leads to the best subjective results. The problem with strict analog paths is that every step degrades the end result. But, once the music is in numbers no further degradation occurs until the last analog step. Computers do not hear distortion, they only hear ones and zeros and at a speed the human brain can not comprehend. This does not take into account the difficulties and limitations imposed by such processes as dragging a rock through a trench. 

It takes extreme objectivity to set up speakers in a room with appropriate acoustic adjustments to make a system perform near it's best. But to get all the way there requires digital signal processing or extreme luck. In my own experience that would be twice in hundreds of systems.

You can not get to the absolute sound by throwing a lot of money at a system. 

@rauliruegas , of course it is about the music. I listen to vinyl and continue to improve my vinyl playback because at least 1/2 of the music I love is planted there. Sometimes the digital transcriptions do not fair well because of poor mastering. As I think you were trying to suggest, predetermined bias contaminates the issue, the result of intentional misdirection by marketing and the unintentional misdirection by biased reviewers. 

@mikelavigne , My answer is simple. Bernie is wrong, dead wrong. Done in 24/192 or above transformations are transparent. The system I use operates in 64 bit floating point so volume does not matter at all. 24/192 recordings of the turntable are indistinguishable from the original unless there is a scratch then the recording sounds better because the scratch is gone. It was removed prior to RIAA correction when its duration is shortest. The "hole" is filled in with a duplicate of the prior millisecond or so of music. Nobody would ever know where there was a scratch.

As @rauliruegas suggests, you can use any audio tool to make things worse. The beauty of digital signal processing is that if used correctly deficiencies in any system (includes the room) can usually be resolved resulting in a dramatic improvement in sound quality. But there are limitations and acoustics have to be managed so that digital corrections are minimal particularly in the bass region or one can rapidly run out of amplifier power. 

There is no system than could not benefit from digital signal processing. Processors are running so fast now that there is virtually no down side unless you are the type that insists on everything remaining analog, the horse and buggy crowd.  

Great discussion!

@clearthink , I owned a Revox A77 for a decade and we had a Studer at the shop I worked with down in Miami. We recorded chamber concerts with it and used it for demonstrating big systems including the HQD system. Mr Grundman's opinion is dead wrong. Everyone is entitled to be dead wrong on occasion. There is no accounting for bias. 

@atmasphere, ​​@rauliruegas I wish you guys would kiss and make up.

For me it is not a battle between analog and digital. The fact of the matter is we all listen in analog. Digital sounds pretty awful, screeching would be the best description. Analog is always the end game. But, digital can also be used to make analog sound better with less noise, distortion and phase/time incoherence. Digital can also be used to crossover speakers more accurately and correct amplitude errors. All these things are impossible to do in the analog world without imposing significant errors.

Back to the DaVa. It is not a cartridge I would buy sight unseen and unheard. IMHE cartridges made by cottage industry manufacturers have quality issues and their very existence is tenuous at best. I have no difficulty buying an Ortofon MC Diamond sight unseen and unheard because I am very comfortable with the manufacturer and technology behind it. Also IMHE, products that stand out sonically at first listen are usually in error somewhere. It is the products that do not stand out sonically at first listen that are usually accurate and additional listening will bear that out. 

@atmasphere , For every one person who buys an LP 10,000 people buy a digital file. LPs are certainly making a comeback but I have a feeling that will extinguish with the Zoomer generation. But, who knows.

@rauliruegas , you forget what my profession is. Your brain has absolutely no idea what to do with a succession of ones and zeros. We only hear digital after it is converted to analog. I know you Mexicans hate us Americans but we make some darn good wine now. 

@rauliruegas , I hope you did not take my Mexican comment seriously. But, to get a French Cab better than Say a Duckhorn or Rombauer you would have to spend a fortune. For most people the above wines are a fortune. The problem for us is much of the best French wines stay in France. We shall see as the wife and I are going to cycle through Provence next Summer. And, buy the way, everything the French know they were taught by the Italians and my absolute favorite wine is the Antenori Tignanello. I do not think you can touch a bottle for less than $125 now.

Digital rules, but analog is fun (if you have the money.)

As for our ears I disagree with that analogy. Yes, the individual hair cells are an on or off proposition. Each one contributes to a voltage. The Voltages are added up to make an analog wave form. They do not trigger a one or a two. If anything it is more similar to pulse width modulation. 

@dover , Speak for yourself. I can listen to a fax tone for hours:-)

I shall now answer the OP's question. The best cartridge in the world is always the one I have mounted at the moment.

@atmasphere , I agree! I by current music on LP all the time. There is plenty of money to be made on LPs but it is no where what it use to be in the 70's.

My children love music. They turn me on to new music all the time like Black Midi. They have absolutely no interest in LPs. They represent the vast majority of young people. If I were a betting man I would bet LPs will be dead within 50 years. I won't be here to see it. I spin records because I have been doing it all my life from the age of 4 and like most humans I hate change. If I look at my own purchases it is about 50/50 LPs to digital files. What does that say?

@r_f_sayles "our ears and tastes are too varied."

That is a lame excuse. More accurate is always better. If I play a hi fidelity recording of an oncoming train on a table radio you will not jump out of the way. You will know instantly that it is a recording of a train played on a rather low fi device. If I put a hi fidelity recording on a state of the art system and waltz you into the room blindfolded you will wind up cowering in a corner when the train passes by. There is accurate and there is everything else. When dealing with a group of highly accurate systems capable of real output at 18 Hz, issues of taste may arise but, as Aryton Senna da Silva said, "second is just the first of the losers." When dealing with less than stellar systems taste becomes more of an issue relative to what defects you can live with. Hiding behind cable elevators and fancy cables will not help

It is chasing accuracy that makes this difficult and therefore entertaining. Viva the difficulty.

@rauliruegas , no argument from me. Only in countries where people have large amounts of expendable income is the LP going to persist.

@atmasphere , modern 64 bit floating point processors can lose a bunch of bits before distortion becomes any issue close to being audible. This is more important than just volume controls. In order to do "room control" effectively you have to be able to cut digital volume as well as boost it at various frequencies. This has to be done without adding distortion on one hand and overloading amplifiers and speakers on the other. The technology is now fully up to the task. The new DEQX Premate series should be amazing on all accounts judging from what I have read. 

I have never heard a silent LP, quiet ones yes, silent no. Also, LPs are not reliably quiet. Some are throw away noisy from the very start. Dust? Contaminated PVC? Recycled PVC? Bad handling? It is a very fragile process. As long as you have a backup disc digital files are 100% reliable in terms of playability and noise levels. You can not get a file with a scratch on it. This says nothing about the music.

Records may be improving overall but there is such wide variation in quality it is hard to see or hear. Some of my European Classical albums from the 70s and 80's are fabulously quiet and are great recordings. I can not imaging new releases being any better.

@rauliruegas , I average about two records a week or 8-9 monthly. My guess is 75% new and 25% reissue. What happens in the future is no concern of mine but I agree the era of vinyl records will end eventually, certainly by the end of this century. My wife made me buy a new Garmin watch because it has an SPO2 meter built in and it does home sleep studies. She thinks I have sleep apnea. It will also take you anywhere in the world, manage 8 different sports, the weather, traffic and your health. All this in a watch. Think where we were 100 years ago, the 1920's. Where will we be in 100 years? 

@ghdprentice , Anyone who thinks vinyl records are a problem needs to go to a dump and look around. Think of mountains of used car batteries that can not be recycled and all the toxic sh-t in them. Be very careful what you wish for.

I have no trouble understanding @rauliruegas  and in general I tend to agree with him but other than, " I do not believe that the members of this thread realize what they are talking about," I have no idea what @nandric is trying to say. Is this just me or are others having the sane problem? Nandric, we are talkin about cartridges. You know, those silly things we clamp to the end of out tonearms.

@nandric. You can say a lot of things about a cartridge without hearing it by virtue of it's design and quality of manufacture. The more experience you have the better.

No, you can not say what the cartridge sounds like but the purchasing decision is more frequently than not made without auditioning the cartridge in the purchaser's system. Not only this but there is wide variation on what "sounds good" means. Most audiophiles have no idea what they are listening too. They have no experience with measurement techniques that tell you what your system and room are doing and the variation between channels. What they think "sounds good" is just what they are use to hearing. Most audiophiles have never heard a system with state of the art imaging. 

@solypsa, The question comes down to what cartridge I want to buy. It is rare to be able to evaluate a cartridge's sonic performance appropriately on your own turntable.  As time goes on, having dealt with quite a few cartridges you develop preferences. Any cartridge I buy is going to be a low impedance moving coil. They seem to be the only moving coil cartridges that with a transimpedance phono stage match the dynamics of the best moving magnet and iron cartridges yet maintain the nuance of a moving coil. It must have some type of fine line stylus. I have heard the Gyger S, the Replicant 100, the Soundsmith OLC and the MSL fine line. They are all excellent. It must have either a Boron or Diamond cantilever. It must have a sturdy, resonance free metal body. The wooden bodied cartridges I have owned have all been colored or poorly manufactured. The cartridge has to be perfectly aligned or so close that I can not tell it is off and I measure each and every cartridge I get. Reviews also factor in to some degree as does the manufacturer's reputation and stability. I will not buy a cartridge from a cottage manufacturer. 

Unfortunately, meeting all these requirements is no guarantee of great performance but it is a good start. Again, these are my own personal preferences or biases. If money was a real issue I would buy a Soundsmith Voice. It is the best cartridge for the money I have ever had direct experience with and it is high output!   

@solypsa, again, this is my personal experience and guides my own cartridge purchases. I have had two wooden bodied cartridges and their sonic performance was not as good as (read colored) the best metal units and their construction quality was not as good. Wood is not a good substrate for a cartridge. Unless it is resin treated wood is not stable, it expands and contracts with humidity. An ideal cartridge body has to be dense, stable and non resonant. Even resin treated wood is not dense enough. If you had to make a wooden cartridge Lignum Vitae would be the best choice and no one uses it!  Using a "tone wood" is a huge joke as in cartridge profile wood has no tone, that is it's advantage, it does not ring unless it is planed very thin. 

Our definition of a cottage industry differs. It is easier to define not cottage industry as larger, well established companies with a long history of making highly rated cartridges with mature technology. This does not guaranty fine performance, nothing does. As an example, DS Audio does not qualify in my eyes because I do not think it's technology is mature yet. In my eyes Lyra and Soundsmith are not cottage industries. I should also note that it is possible for a cottage industry cartridge maker to make a fine cartridge. IMHO just less likely. I am not going to plop down 10 large on less likely. 

@larryi , given the right circumstances the old 57 could be a fine performer. The Levinson HQD system was the first system that I would qualify as SOTA in it's day. It's main problems were reliability and durability. It was neither. 

Tubes may in some people's minds sound better but it is relatively rare for them to be more accurate. Human's are instinctively drawn to fire and light. Fire and light are safety and security. I am not kidding. Human behavior frequently has an instinctive basis. Women like SUVs because they place them above the traffic. They like being up higher. Higher is safety. You can see your enemies coming and hide your children. My pack rat mentality in an instinctive behavior. You never want to run out of ammunition. 

@lewm , digital is more accurate. There can be no doubt about this. It is superior in every and all measurable parameters.  This says nothing about "sounding better." Beauty is in the ear of the beholder. 

@rauliruegas , My wood comment pertains to cartridges only. I have owned a Koetsu Rosewood and a Grado Statement. Yes, wood can be treated in a number of ways but it will never be as inert and massive as a metal. Resin treated it can be used effectively in tonearms but I still prefer a metal or fiberglass wand. I have not yet heard an Epoch and at this point have no desire as I have focused on very low impedance moving coils. Like me you think the Ortofon MC Diamond is a killer cartridge design. So, don't give me this BS on wooden cartridges :-)

@atmasphere , I think there is a lot more to it than sound quality. 45% of album sales are to people 18 to 35 years of age, people at the beginning of their careers who can ill afford expensive turntable gear. Records make great collectibles. You get a much nicer token of the artist than a digital file. You get nothing streaming. Lets not talk about CDs. Men in particular instinctively like machines and tools almost absent in the digital world.

There is no best cartridge. The sound quality of records is so variable you could not discern a best cartridge through them. Anybody going to change cartridges with each record? You also have to take into consideration the tonearm and phono stage but, there is no best "system" for the same reason.  

@dover , I listened extensively to Soundsmith's Strain Gauge cartridge with records I know intimately. It has excellent transient response and a very vivid signature partially because it is too bright. It's tracking ability does not come close to that of the Hyperion. I decided not to get one. The Hyperion is a cartridge I could live with and may in time get one. The cartridges I own indicate what I think is best. The MSL Signature Platinum, The Lyra Atlas Lambda SL and the Ortofon MC Diamond. 

@osada22 , the DAVA is a poorly constructed, ill thought out, piece of junk. I would never let one get near my turntable. @rauliruegas's purpose is to warn people away from the DAVA and he is right.

@dover , I auditioned the strain gauge at Peter's listening room. He spent two hours with me. I really wanted to like the strain gauge but it was just too sharp on female voices and violins for my taste. The Hyperion is more to my liking. From the Voice upwards Peter makes a great cartridges. You can't go wrong with any of them. The Strain gauge is a unique outlier but it is not an easy nut to crack. My sense is that Peter like's the challenge. He also admits and will tell you that the Hyperion can handle over twice the velocity the strain gauge can tolerate. 

I listen at 95 dB to material that warrants it. That is quite a bit softer than 100 dB.

My hearing, like anyone my age is slightly rolled off on top. I compensate by boosting the treble from 12 kHz up at 6 dB/oct.  

@mikelavigne , I hate to tell you this but you never owned an MC Diamond.  They were just released. I have one of the very first ones in the country and it isn't even in my hands yet. 

With the availability of rare earth magnets, strangling a cartridge with field coils is a silly proposition and as I said before, what you think it sounds like means absolutely zero to me. I would never buy one or even look at it because it is a Rube Goldberg device. You are absolutely entitled to enjoy yours.

@rsf507 , You bet. The Platinum Signature is a little Jewel. It has the tiniest stylus I have ever seen. It is typical of the best cartridges. Nothing stands out immediately. You have to listen to a few albums you know to get the lay of the land. It is balanced, detailed, dynamic and the bass in transimpedance mode is the best I have ever heard. ( I have not listened to the Lyra or the Ortofon yet. They are payed for but not yet in my hands.) The tracking has been flawless. When I have all three cartridges I will make digital files of them playing the same material and put them on line. I expect they will sound very similar. 

@mikelavigne , The MC Diamond has incorporated several improvements from the Verismo the Anna Diamond did not have. It is not the same cartridge. Yes, they did change the name because of Russian aggression as if that has anything to do with an opera singer. The Russians are wonderful people with a unique culture. It is the remaining Soviets that are Fed up. I could understand if the cartridge was named The Stalin.

@thekong , it is unusual for Ortofon to go backwards. They are also extremely conservative with their specs. At any rate I will find out shortly.

@rsf507 , I have only heard my Platinum Signature. The hearsay is that the Gold is slightly warmer than the Platinum. The Platinum should track better but again that is an assumption. What I can say for sure is the quality of construction is absolutely top notch. The diamond is perfectly clear, beautifully polished ( I have a Wallyscope) and tiny. It is 1/2 the size of Soundsmith's OLC stylus which is already quite small. When you play a record it looks like the cantilever is sitting right on the record. 

These are very low impedance cartridges best used with a transimpedance phono stage even though they have very acceptable output. There is definitely more gain in transimpedance mode and the bass has better definition.  

@atmasphere ,yes, that is the cause of the brightness and I could EQ that easily in the digital realm but the real deal breaker for me was the strain gauge's tracking ability. Peter thinks he has got it as good as he can and feels it is acceptable. Generally I will only look at cartridges that can do 80um or better at 315Hz. Miss-tracking is very annoying. Miss-track a record once and it is permanently damaged.

@edgewear , Ortofon is very conservative with it's ratings and list's the MC Diamonds tracking ability at 315 Hz as 80um which is excellent and should easily handle any record. The Replicant 100 and GygerS styluses are the two most severe styluses out there and really have to be spot on in the groove. If you are still miss-tracking it is either a set up problem or just as likely something else you are hearing like phono stage clipping. 

When I have mine in hand I will run it through the torture course and report back what it can do. Yours should do the same.  

An interesting aside when it comes to styluses. The line contact stylus of the MSL Platinum Signature is really quite special. Unlike other line contact styluses I have looked at, the tip of the MSL stylus is broadly radiused. It's azimuth can actually be off a few degrees and the tracking would not be affected at all. Channel separation would still suffer but not tracking or record wear. I have not had the chance to look at an Air Tight stylus but given the same designer I suspect it is similar. The Air Tights were very popular for a while but it seems you hardly hear about them any more. I do think the Opus 1 is overpriced so, fewer people are willing to shell out for it.

It is also interesting to note that in spite of it's rather high voltage output the Platinum Signature's gain is about 5 dB higher in transimpedance mode than in voltage mode. It is also as dynamic as any high output cartridge I have heard in transimpedance mode. What is just as special and the one area where this set up excels over any other I have used in my system is bass definition. Marcus Miller's bass now has almost the same gruf timbre it had at the Blue Note a month ago. I still think the bass could be better but I still have improvements to make in my subwoofer system. 

@mulveling , Mr Matsudaira calls it SH-uX, a high flux-high permeability armature material. I have no idea what this means but his cartridges are renown for high output voltages in spite of having very low internal impedances. All I can say for sure is that he makes a beautifully crafted, great sounding cartridge that anyone can buy with confidence. 

As for the MC Diamond's spec, who knows? Maybe it's a typo or the humidity was really high the day they did the testing. Ortofon is very conservative with their specs. On their web site the MC Diamond's channel balance is within 0.5 dB and separation at 15 kHz 20 db , at 1kHz 25 dB.  I would bet at 1kHz it will be more like 35 dB. I will measure it for sure. Whatever the old Anna Diamond was universally liked and Ortofon rarely goes backwards. The Verismo is robably a better value. 

@edgewear , wow, lay of the defensive stuff. Your Anna has been through the ringer and I would think you would want to know if it was performing normally.

Not one review I read of the Anna Diamond mentioned tracking problems. But, I have purchased clinker cartridges before, just not $10,000 ones😬

@atmasphere , It was mounted in a Schroder Reference. I did not hear it miss track. Nothing we played was that challenging. Peter himself admits the cartridge can't handle the highest velocities but he also says the cartridge is particularly kind to the grooves playing lacquers repeatedly without hurting them. I should also add there is the factor of buying a dedicated interface making it a system unto itself. Whatever the reason my instinct decided not to go with it. I also had a bad experience with Sao Win's cartridge back in the early 80's but I think I factored that out of my decision making.

@atmasphere 1++,  balanced cables are the only way to go with analog signals even with short runs.

@reimarc ,Great! I was getting worried. The Decca London Reference is an awful cartridge. It is a terrible tracker and very unreliable. With those issues what it sounds like is irrelevant. You have several wonderful cartridges in your price range. The Ortofon Winfeld Ti and the Verismo. The MSL Hyper Eminent EX and the Lyra Kleos. Judging by what you have said so far I think the MSL would suit you best it being the warmest of the group. The Ortofons and the Lyra are very neutral, nothing hangs out at first. For me this is the hallmark of a great cartridge.  

@dogberry  , I never listen to anything else I have to say, worthless drivel. 

@rauliruegas, @atmasphere, @mikelavigne  I think we can all agree that balanced signal cables are essential for long runs. The benefits in signal to noise ratio and other parameters can not be overlooked. I am beginning to learn that the same is true when dealing with small signal levels. I have recorded Sheffield Lab 17 balanced, unbalanced, with and without digital RIAA correction. I have yet to involve other listeners and I will after I figure out the best way to transfer that much data. Gammaman has the Classic Records 45 rpm crate set of all the Led Zeppelin albums. I’m up there now to Zoso and loving every minute.

@dogberry , you are absolutely right that in order to make comparisons in audio, volume levels need to be matched perfectly. The louder signal between sources of almost equal quality is always going to sound better even if you can't tell that it is louder. Where you are off a bit is in magnitude. In order to fool the human ear you only need a 0.3 dB difference in volume. That is far below the resolution of any common measurement device. If comparing electronic gear this can be done with a test signal and an accurate meter or oscilloscope. In comparing program sources like different pressings of an album it gets much tougher. Using a sound pressure meter is really no better than using your ears which can get you within a dB if you are good at it but never under 0.3 db unless you are very lucky. This is one main reason why you see so many varied opinions on comparisons.  Overlay the biases we all develop and you have a real mess. We can use our ears to evaluate equipment to a degree if the differences are severe enough. If not then you have to be very careful.

@pindac. As I stated above a dB meter is not near accurate enough to make these comparisons fair. I have one which I use to make sure I am not damaging my ears when I crank it. With cartridge comparisons you can use a test record and a meter or oscilloscope on the output of the phono stage. Comparing program sources is a much more difficult proposition. An oscilloscope with a peak hold function could do it but the set up would be very cumbersome and to prove what? I prefer just listening to the version I like which is precisely what the vast majority of us deplorables do:-)

@noromance , either you are a master at caring for your equipment or the people I know who have or have had Deccas are incredibly ham fisted. I have personally heard them miss track on material other cartridges handled effortlessly. I was never enamored by the SQ but I never did have one in my own system. At this point I would never recommend anyone get one unless they really did not care about throwing their money away.

@lewm , thank you and you are right. No human ear I know of can reliably call 0.3dB a change of volume but it can trick the ear into thinking a version sounds better.  Using channel balance as a gauge a 0.3 dB change will make a noticeable shift in the center image easily noticed by anyone. Having a digital volume control with resolution down to 0.1 dB I can demonstrate this to anyone. You would not notice it as a volume change just a shift in the center image. 

@rauliruegas , As with any generalization there are always ways to fail but as a useful rule If I increase the volume of one of two exactly identical passages 0.3 dB casual listeners will think the louder version sounds better without noticing the increase in volume. I know this because I make this demonstration all the time. I have a digital volume control with resolution down to 0.1 dB.  If you are doing this in real time on the same system all that other stuff you mention cancels out. everything you say is true but it is all easy to factor out of the equation. 

@intactaudio , it really depends on how you are listening to the volume. If you are just paying attention to a system's volume level then 1dB is a just noticeable difference but if you are listening in a comparative way as you are when listening to channel balance 1 dB is very noticeable and will cause a distinct shift in the center image. This also explains why some systems image poorly. The two channels have to have identical frequency response curves. If one channel is plus or minus a dB here or there the image blurs like an out of focus picture. The same speaker in two different locations will have two different response curves. Variances of 3-5 dB between channels at specific frequencies is common. I have seen upwards of 10 dB!

@lewm , Digital volume is very specific. 0 dB (0 dBFS) is the highest level achievable in a WAV audio file.  Digital volume controls are based on that standard. I have three independent ways of adjusting my gain structure and they all agree with each other perfectly as you would expect. In referring to dB most people are thinking of dB SPL. Where 0 dB is "the sound of a dead leaf hitting the ground in the fall." Anything quieter would be imperceptible. When I talk about how loud my system is playing I am referring to dB SPL as measured by a sound pressure level meter that in all likelihood is not very accurate.  When talking about signal volume I am referring to dBFS (decibels full scale)  I probably should have mentioned this earlier to get everyone on the same page. 

Another issue that frequently comes up is that digital volume controls "are inferior." This was true not all that long ago but now with 64 bit floating point processors the problems related to digital volume control such as loss of dynamic range have totally disappeared. You could lose over 1/2 the data and still be well above the highest sampling rates used.

As @rauliruegas will testify, digital audio opens up a whole new world of possibilities when it comes to system management and understanding. 

@noromance , Please and really, I do not mean this as a reflection of you but I have seen people tolerate a lot worse! Any cartridge will track at 10 grams. Don't you remember the days when we put a penny on top of the head shell?

@rauliruegas , I was being generous. 

My room is also dead centered and I am forever adjusting my balance. Every record is different. Most of the time it is just a sensation of too much energy coming from one side. The singer's voice will still seem dead center. Just a shift of 0.1 to 0.2 dB to one side will take care of it. Yes, I also can usually tell up front how much it will take. I think the problem is that every system is that much different. Maybe one speaker or monitor is just that much more efficient than the other. The best adjusted systems in the world are at best 0.1 to 0.2 dB off center. Anyway, this is what remotes are for:-)

I would like to straighten the record a little. Listening to and enjoying music is a passive luxury. Building a state of the art music system is an active necessity. They are two very different activities. There are chat rooms and one location at this one where you can gush over the music. Here we split hairs over Hi Fi equipment. There are many ways to approach this subject and disagreement is a way of life in any human interaction. If you can't take the heat go fishing.

@frogman , The problem with your statement is that there are millions of music lovers who "honor" the music by listening to it on systems that many of us would find mediocre. Music is no less valuable to them than it is to any of us. We chose to engage ourselves in the additional hobby of system building. Are we honoring the music to a greater extent by building the better sounding systems than someone who can not afford the expense?  

@mikelavigne , Those who know me well know that I place minimal weight on what anybody says anything sounds like. The reason I do this is not to minimize someone's opinion or to critique their listening ability. It is because I have no framework for evaluating what it is they are trying to convey. I have no idea what anybody else is listening to and any comment on sound quality has to be taken in conjunction with what that person is use to listening to. The quality of a person's equipment is no indicator either. 

@noromance 😁😁😁

@mikelavigne , Listening to music together and sharing the experience is a totally different proposition then trying to describe what something sounds like at a 2000 mile distance. In listening together you now have the framework to interpret what that individual is trying to tell you. Now their opinion has meaning.. It is a shame that we are unable to do more shared listening. Perhaps we should form regional groups that get together once or twice a year giving group opinions on this that and the other. Since we are both LZ fans I'm sure we could loosen a few fillings. That has to be the box set of all time. But then there is that Bill Evans Riverside box..... 

The more I listen to the MSL Platinum Signature the more I am impressed by it and the Seta L it is attached to. This is the quietest cartridge I have ever owned. Records that I thought were on the noisy side are now reasonably quiet. Quiet records are as close to silent as a record can get....I think. Actually I can measure it. The digital metering on the Lynx Hilo is accurate to within 1 dB. I'll get back on that.  Bass and drums have a solidity usually reserved for Hi Res digital. The space between the instruments is well defined. Some people call this "air." Nothing sounds stressed. Tracking has been perfect.  I think I can say this is certainly the best cartridge I have ever owned 

@rauliruegas , The Luxman was a good cartridge. Since then Yoshio Matsudaira developed a new core for the armature that gives him higher output ( 0.5 mV) with one layer of wire keeping the impedance very low and the moving mass very low. He started using this in the Air Tight cartridges the Opus 1 being the grand daddy of them all. I think the Platinum Reference is Yoshio's version of the Opus One. The stylus he is using is unique in my experience. The very tip instead of coming to a point is radiused and beveled on both sides, very different from the replicant 100 or Gyger S styluses. It is much more forgiving in set up. The azimuth could be off a few degrees and tracking ability would be unchanged. Cross talk would still worsen but most people would not notice that. The cartridge is really very small and beautifully made. All the angles are dead on. All you need is a good protractor and a Wally Referance and you can get it perfect in just a few minutes, no microscope required. Sonically nothing stands out at first. After a few records I became aware that I was getting better bass definition. The next characteristic that became obvious after a few more records was an easy going stress less demeanor. Not sibilance at all, not a sharp edge anywhere unless called for. It is very hard not to like this cartridge.     

@dover , That was my feeling exactly which is why I opted for the Platinum Signature. 

It is in the bass where the physics of analog playback become really difficult. No such difficulty occurs with digital playback. Digital bass reproduction is universally more accurate. It does not have to deal with resonance frequencies, tracking, etc. Again, accurate does not necessarily mean better sounding to some people.

@rauliruegas , The Opus One has a Duralumin body. It's cantilever is boron. The Platinum signature has a "black ion titanium body." Tracking force is exactly the same for both cartridges 1.9 to 2.2 gm The Platinum Signature is slightly more compliant. I suspect they are using the same stylus. I would have to look at an Opus 1 under magnification to determine that. They both use the same SH-uX core which is Matsudaira's trademark. 

@rauliruegas , My thinking on the price is that with MSL cartridges there is one less middleman. Humans being the way they are would typically make their own product better than one made for another company. But regardless of motivation they are both great cartridges. I have studied the Platinum Signature under high magnification and there can be no argument that it's construction quality is of the highest order. It is easy to see why Air Tight would use MSL to build their cartridges. I have never seen a diamond so beautifully shaped, polished and mounted. All angles are perfect. Placed on a spinning180 gm record the VTA is 92 degrees within a few minutes with the head shell perfectly parallel to the record. Impressive!  With my modified Wallyscope set up so  it is focused at a point around 1/2" from the rim of the record you wait until the stylus travels into focus, take a picture then snap lines along the right landmarks and the program will automatically calculate the angle for you. It will be very interesting to see how other cartridges measure up. When I have the other two I will publish pictures on Imgur.

The first thing that stood up for me was the bass. I think that is most likely the combination of a very low impedance cartridge and a current mode phono stage. I actually prefer the build quality of the Seta vs the CH. I do not like the complexity of the CH and I think the utilization of a massive batter power supply in the Seta is brilliant. I would be willing to bet that one would have a very difficult time telling one cartridge from the other.

@dover , I am not a huge Koetsu fan either. I got a Rosewood back in 1979 and I did not like it at all. Construction quality was iffy, the Denon DL 103 was better, and it did not track well at all. I had a Rosewood Signature Platinum for a short while more recently and again I was not impressed. The MSL is decidedly better.

The best cartridge is the one you think sounds most accurate in your system and that is the problem. In order to know for sure you have to buy the cartridge and use it in your system. You research the subject as best you can but there is no substitute for playing a few records on your own system and by then you own it for better or for worse. You will never know if there wasn't a cartridge that would have suited you better.

@daveyf ,  I have discovered , having purchased 3 top cartridges recently, that online stores will give distant buyers a 10% discount by adding a trade in if they are comfortable with you. You still have to buy the cartridge.

What would be fun would be to start a new online store that just rents cartridges. The customer would have to deposit the full price of the cartridge which would be refunded minus the rental fee when the cartridge is returned in satisfactory condition. You could serially rent all the cartridges you felt were candidates. Having all those cartridges in hand one could also publish photos of build quality and customer reviews of the cartridges. Might be a fun retirement gig. The site could get all it's cartridges at dealer cost by linking those stores that supply cartridges to the site for free.  

@ghdprentice , If you can't take the heat get out of the kitchen. I would never let anyone else touch my turntable. The question would be what percentage of turntable owners who might be interested in a site like this are comfortable handling cartridges. A site like this could actually save people a lot of money. You might discover that you can not hear the difference between a Windfeld Ti and an MC Diamond in your system. That is a $5000 savings. 

@mulveling , that is why you hold the cost of the cartridge in escrow. Yes, in some instances one might actually prefer the less expensive cartridge. 

A cartridge screwed down tight inside it's box is virtually impossible to damage without obvious intrusion into the shipping carton which with insurance would have to be covered by the shipper. The actual cost to the customer would be whatever it costs to get a stylus replacement from the original manufacturer. The customer then owns the cartridge which he or she could sell on Audigon as a new cartridge as long as they do not break the seal. So, it is not a total loss to the customer, certainly an inconvenience.