Cartridges that get strings right?

I should also add that I upgraded cartridges, then tonearms, then table, against expert advice, which was, table first, tonearm second, cartridge third. I should have listened to that advice, and saved myself some money.

Thing is, a TT generates noise. It's best to reduce that. The tonearm holds the cartridge in precise relation to the record. It's best if that precise relation is the correct one.

Asking a cartridge to make up for the TT and the tonearm is asking far too much, even of a precision instrument.

Pingvin,

I have a dedicated tt setup for classical and hesitate to mention what it is because there is little respect for this make and approach. Strings sound breathtaking. Until I discovered this a couple of years ago I never played symphonic music, only chamber music, because the string section always sounded like a smear of strings rather than a string section. I grew up in Philadelphia during the Ormandy era and regularly attended concerts with my parents. Close friends of theirs played violin (father)  and cello (son) in the Orchestra. I know what strings should sound like. When I close my eyes I'm experiencing that. While writing this the last movement of the Nielsen Violin Concerto finished. Please contact me if you wish to hear about the tt/cart setup. 

I agree with (almost) everything already said here.  IMO speakers are the single component most critical to whatever sound you are trying to achieve.  No other single component will make as much as a difference to your systems sound.

Other components will "dial in" the sound, some more and some less, but if your speakers aren't getting you close to what you are looking to hear then you are not going to hit the mark.  A change of cartridge will not overcome a speaker/room/amp compatibility mismatch.

Sama kuin menis perse edellä puuhun.
Means: The same as climbing on a three butt first.

Dear friends: All of us know that every link in the room/system chain is important.

Each of those links makes its own room/system degradation at different levels and something that we can’t avoid. The best we can do is to put at " minimum ". This " minimum " is really elusive trget to achieve it because all links inter-relationship in between.

Now, transducers links are the ones that degrades in higher way the reproduced signal.
So, cartridge and room/speakers are the must critical links in the whole chain. Both links at both room/system extremes.

The source of the signal ( other than the LP or CD. ) is the cartridge and has ( for me. ) the main responsability for what we are hearing because any recorded signal information that’s losted down there we just never will recover it.

In other degree the room/speakers link has another main responsability and we have to take good care here because is where the signal can suffer more degradation.

We can have very good speakers but if our cartridge has poor tracking abilities we can’t have the resolution need it to really have that " strings rigth ".

Unfortunatelly that links interrelationship makes that everything depends on each one link quality level. Of course that two other links are each one of us MUSIC/sound knowledge levels and money we have for the audio system. So there are several limitations every where.

Regards and enjoy the MUSIC NOT DISTORTIONS,
R.