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What innovative, unconventional cartridge designs can you recommend?

Most cartridges have a stylus and cantilever where the transducer (magnet, iron or coil) sits on the far end of the cantilever.  What other designs are there?

I am mindful of two designs which put the business end right on top of the stylus.  The first is the moving coil (MC) Audio Technica AT-ART1000 which places two tiny coils, each 0.9-mm diameter, with eight turns of wire directly above the stylus.  Australian price is about AUD-7000 and there apparently is a newer model, slightly less exxe. the ART1000X.  This has square coils for a bit more output, and threaded mounting holes.

A downside is that stylus replacement involves a factory maintenance program and the Australian website page describing this service does not exist.

Another design is optical, exemplified by DS Audio's range.  While these still need a stylus to trace the groove, the signal is produced by reading the intensity of light produced by a Light Emitting Diode (LED) hitting two sensors.  Between the LED and the sensors are two 'shades' mounted above the stylus which change the amount of light as the stylus vibrates.  These cartridges need a special "photo-stage" to replace the conventional phono-stage which is an additional expense.

Australian prices including photo-stages range from AUD-2,150 for the DS-E1 to the DS Master 3 at approximately AUD-40,800, which is a bit outside my price range!  Where is the sweet spot?

What other way-out designs are there?

richardbrand
lewm
14,702 posts
 

I misspoke; the optical sensor might need two diodes per channel, one for each phase of a balanced output per channel, not two diodes per phase as I wrote earlier. And I totally agree, the very high signal voltage output and high SN ratio might render the advantages of balanced operation moot.

richardbrand's avatar
richardbrand OP
1,424 posts
 

@lewm 

My understanding is that doubling up is the way solid state handles balanced right through the audio chain?

As sod’s law would have it, I have a silver Litz tone arm cable with XLR connectors ready to install in my Garrard / SME deck.  It will plug straight into the SoulNote but will only operate in balanced mode if I buy an MC cartridge!  SoulNote presumably would rather ignore peasants like me with MM cartridges at the E1 price point...

Meanwhile I am absolutely delighted with the sonics coming from my Jico / Shure MM through the SoulNote.  Another win for you!

dogberry
966 posts
 

Can’t see too many being happy about pulling extra wires through their tone arms.

And yet the SS strain gauge does not require extra wires, I believe. Presumably the light in that cartridge receives its power through the two ground cables? Why didn't DS choose to do that? Having to run extra wires through a tonearm is a large downside, and one I wasn't aware of.

cleeds
6,601 posts
 
richardbrand 

... doubling up is the way solid state handles balanced right through the audio chain ....

I'm not sure exactly what you mean by "doubling up," but that's not the way a differentially balanced amplifier works. It doesn't have a separate path for each leg of the balanced circuit.

richardbrand's avatar
richardbrand OP
1,424 posts
 

@dogberry 

And yet the SS strain gauge does not require extra wires, I believe. Presumably the light in that cartridge receives its power through the two ground cables? Why didn't DS choose to do that

That is exactly what DS Audio does in all its contemporary cartridges - it uses the two ground wires to deliver DC power to the active LEDs and optical sensors.

A consequence is that there is only one wire left to carry the signal for each channel, whereas balanced operation requires two.  So their contemporary 2-channel cartridges do not support balanced operation.

Hypothetically, if DS Audio felt balanced operation was desirable in the future, some other wiring scheme would be needed for 2-channel operation.

They have just released mono versions of their entire contemporary range of cartridges, and these could in theory use 2 wires for the signal and be balanced.

To be clear, all contemporary DS Audio cartridges use the standard 4-wire scheme used in tone arms.  There is absolutely no need to rewire.

I plan to rewire my 55-year-old SME arm for entirely different reasons. The primary one is because there is some corrosion around the connectors, and I had to solder one back on. At the same time I can eliminate two sets of connections in the phono path.  On the other hand, when something is working, don't fix it!

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