What Does It Take To Surpass A SME V?

Citrucel? Nah, we need big guns here.

I used to like the apocryphal advert with the slogan "If the bottom falls out of your world, take Dulcolax and let the world fall out of your bottom."

@albertporter Albert's list of TTs and arms that he remembers using/owning kind of cracks me up. So glad to see you contributing here Albert. 

The rest of yas, love you too. :)

After reading through the thread, @mijostyn post struck a nerve with me. Truth be told I overlooked an important point. As a bit of history, I should say I am a hobbyist of modest means, and while I appreciate audio gear, I must be creative and opportunistic on how I spend money to build a system. In this world of connectivity and Paypal I am blessed to have the opportunity to own gear above what I could afford if buying from just new at a retail store. I am fortunate to own what I do, and it requires that I be a careful shopper. Within my system the SOTA Cosmos Eclipse was bought new, and I bought a Scheu Audio Laufwerk No 2 as a dealer demo. My JBL 4365 were less than a year old when bought. Everything else has come off the used market, such as an Esoteric E-03 phono stage, a pair of Classe Omega monoblock amps, and a Trinov Amethyst pre-amplifier.

The Transfiguration Proteus came from a dealer as a customer trade in. I knew the hours on it, and I sent it to VAS for service after about 6 months. At this time Matsudairasan had already passed and there were limited options for service. I removed the cartridge from the table and sent it in, and the table sat while I waited for a new diamond. When the cartridge came back i reinstalled it and verified settings and began playing music. That was a mistake, because the differences in diamond and mounting apparently are significant enough to cause issues.

 

Last night I reset overhang. Of course the previous setting is remarkably close and once you loosen the sled then all bets are off, its really a reset. Even though the SME headshell is not slotted, it allows for the slightest adjustments in offset. I worked with that, reset VTA, and dialed tracking force down a couple tenths of a gram.

The result is a significantly more immediate sound with improved attack and presence. Dynamic contrasts are improved, and bass response is not overblown and has improved timing. All around a better sound. The lesson I learned is treat a refurbished cartridge as a new installation no matter what.

What does that mean moving forward? Well it buys me time for one. I can be more introspective and deliberate on a choice of different arm. Before I make any decisions, I am going to wait and hear what the Ortofon Verismo sounds like as it is just being finished up. Once I hear this arm with both cartridges, then I can make a decision on where I might go. Sometimes I wonder about consolidating all my analog goodies, and a sale of the Scheu and both Dynavector arms could allow me to purchase a top end arm for the SOTA. But I am not sure I can live with one cartridge, as I do value being able to have a cartridge for casual listening and not fret about burning up stylus hours.

All in all this is not a bad place to be. One thing the Classe amps have taught me is that upper tier gear made in the last 10 to 15 years is still remarkable, and capable of holding its own with many other fine audio components. So what I chose for a replacement arm does not have to be the current darling, but it does need to be a superior product with above average engineering and craftsmanship.

When considering a change for the better to my Analogue Set Up. I was confident the most benefit was to be had from having the Phonostage in place that offered the most to meet my needs.

To get the best handle on this idea, I have a few thousand+ road mile journeys behind me, and have received demo's of numerous phonostages.

After having experienced the most typical circuitry and maybe a few more not so typical, where demo' Models have had a Value of up to £10K, I was Wed to the Valve Phon', not the Rich in Tone Designs, the Lean End of the Scale, was where I found my preference.

I was quite sure work done to the owned SME IV Tonearm was able to lift it to a level to be ideal for my Phonostage ambition. I certainly felt sure I had done the footwork and was to get the results to talk about and share with others in use.

Not as such, at a home event arranged by a forum member, I was given a unexpected and surprise invite.

At this social gathering I encountered a group made up of EE's, EE Minded and Trained Mechanical Engineers and Enthusiast Mechanical Engineers.

All present I had come to learn were known for having created a design for Analogue Source that had recognised to have been very beneficial.

I was informed I was invited as the host thought I might enjoy experiencing some the equipment brought along for demo'. The host made the right call about myself.

For weeks after this event, I was in wonderment about one Demo' probably the 'Show Stopper' and all who were present were very appraising of the work undertaken to get to the presentation on offer. 

The Demo' that was captivating was produced by a Tonearm. I made inquiries and arranged for a further Demo' at the producers home.

On a Solid State System, with Cabinet Speakers ( I don't do either as a full system), I was once more introduced to the Vinyl Source I was captivated by.

The introduction was a little educational as well, as the producer thought I would like to be shown how the Working Prototypes produced over a period of time sounded and compared. 

I had been given descriptions of how the design evolved and had been introduced to the use of modern materials within the evolving design.

I know of materials that are selected to be used today that are with inherent properties that far outperform common used materials selected for most Brands past and present Tonearm Designs.

The stability of these materials have enabled a whole new R&D in relation to machining tolerances and friction control.

Reduced Machining Tolerances have resulted, with improved dimensions to further  minimise movement. The Modern Materials of a certain type, have allowed for no increase in friction as a result of materials remaining so stable when used in the environment chosen for them.

I was on this first experience with the Tonearm Producer, demonstrated the Tonearm Design as Three Different Assemblies, from a period of R&D.

The differences were materials used to interface with the bearings.

One with a typical selected material, with the parts produced to the tightest usable tolerance.  One with a early adopted Modern Material for the R&D stages, that was claimed to be very good, much improved over the Typical choice, but had a stability that was prone to increase a impact of friction at times, so machining tolerances, even though tighter than a typical materials tolerance allowance, had to be accounted for, as a control measure. It took quite a few attempts to optimise this materials usage at a interface.

Last but not least, One with a material discovered that is extremely stable and can receive much tighter tolerances for the machining without a unwanted impact on the friction and overall freedom of the Mechanical Function.

All Three Arm Designs were swapped out over the course of a Few Hours, where each was used with the same TT>Cart' and on the same system.

The last one was quite something of a revelation, it was indelible as a experience and I own a later guise of it.

On this same period of demo's, one other Tonearm was to be demo'd, it was produced with the same materials as Tonearm that was extremely impressive, but had New Bearing used that were much more suitable to the modern material and environment to be used in.

The experience of this Demo' is nearly six years past and the impression made remains, which is basically the Fourth Tonearm demo'd, was seemingly a substantially improved Arm over the Three Arms Demo'd, but way beyond the performance of the The Third Tonearm Demo'd, which was the one I was already sold on.

The Design for the Arm I own, has been further tweaked by the designer over the period I have owned the Arm. I have been instrumental in encouraging some of the investigation undertaken and now adopted.

I have been invited to the be demo'd the finished work over the past years and have always heard it compared to my Tonearm Model.

The latest guise has the X Factor there is something that is not describable present, it has to be experienced to fully understand how accurate and desirable  the presentation is. 

 

 

@lewm , I wouldn't know Lew. Since I have been studying cartridges more carefully I have not seen any noticeable zenith error. Having said that I have seen some pretty shabby stylus assemblies the worse being an inexpensive AT cartridge. I was not looking for Zenith error at the time. More critical than a frequency response printout, manufacturers should start giving customers photographs of their stylus assemblies. 

@neonknight , Good work. Great preamplifier! I almost bought one but I decided to wait for the new DEQX Pre 8. Since you are already digitizing your phono stage you might want to look into Channel D's Pure Vinyl program. It gives you the ability to record records in 24/192 and you can use software RIAA correction which is insane. You can raid friends vinyl collections. 

@albertporter , Do to my experience with early direct drive units I am permanently biased against them. Since I am no longer in the business I am unable to compare new ones. Best to stick with what you know. Idler wheel drives were a necessity prior to electronic motor control. They are an archaic design which should have remained in the dust bin of history, but then again people still buy Shelby Cobras. There is no accounting for taste. More bearings equal more noise which will get worse as the turntable ages. This leaves the belt drive which the majority of engineers that design turntables prefer. A turntable that "sounds" is defective. Turntables, tonearms and cartridges are not supposed to have a sound of their own. They should sound only like the music on the record. This is not a wine tasting competition.