Gonna have to ditch the Soundsmith Carmen II


I've given this cart the benefit of the doubt and then some, but it's going to have to go. 

the sibilance on s's is just to much. The sound isn't distorted, just way louder than the rest of the vocals. This happens to one degree or the other on all records with vocals. Sometimes it's barely noticeable sometimes it hard to bare. other than the sibilance I love the sound, I love the live nature of the music.  so I hate getting rid of it. 

So so the things I've done and made sure are dead on:

alighnment - that means SRA, VTA, TF, Azimuth, anti skate (per,SS), platter level, checked mounting hardware, checked tunntable . . .etc

my Denon 2x20L doesn't do this.

it may be there is a bad combo with some piece of equipment or loudspeaker and it just doesn't jive with the rest of the rig. 

My system:

VPI prime
Parasound JC3+ Phono pre
PAD phono cables
Decware integrated SET tube amp
Zu Omen Def MKII with Radian tweeter upgrade. 

So the question is what cart, around $1k will give that live dynamic sound, tracks well, but does emphasize the S's?

ones I'im interested in but have no way of hearing:

Ortofon Quintet Black
Audio Technica ART 9
???


last_lemming
If your problem reappears at some point in future, I would next consider the new tweeter, as per John Tracy's post.  It could be a little "hot" by nature or poorly matched to the midrange/woofer for efficiency.  (Meaning if the tweeter efficiency is greater than that of the midrange driver, the result can be a "tipped up" tonal balance.)
What tracking force are you using now? I’m curious because I own this cart and regardless of setup, I haven’t succeeded in getting it to sound quite as good as I expected for the price.
You must remember he did a minor tweak to mine, I’m not sure what he did but he asked me that I track at 1.8g to 1.9g. However after doing that I found it still sounded best at 1.6g,  so that is where I am tracking right now.  

 What are you not getting out of it what you think you should?
^Mostly tonal balance. It seems that bass is weak when the treble is correct and vice versa. I can't find the VTA sweet spot. I don't have this problem with other carts. Maybe I just need to look into capacitance loading.