Dear Justlisten: That's almost normal with re-tipped cartridges.
A new cartridge that has no single playing hour must to settle down especialy in the cartridge suspension before could shines. In a re-tipped one that cartridge suspension is already broke-in and fine tunned for the re-tipper.
The VdH service in its Colibri cartridges is a good example about. They give us a cartridge fine tunning after three months of playing ( the service is free and we only pay the shipping both ways. ) and what they do most than all is to fine tunning the cartridge suspension.
In one of my Colibri's I bented the cantilever not one but in four different times and each time the cartridge was re-tipped sounded great at the very first track played in the LP.
Now, a re-tipped cartridge that was re-tipped for a " universal " retipper source other than the cartridge manufacturer loosed its original performance level. The re-tipped cartridge is a different one, that could like us more than the original is only a result that we are hearing a different cartridge. This is like when we hear a new cartridge that like us more than our current one in the audio system but many times that " I like it more than the other cartridge I own or owned " is only a different " flavor " and not a real best flavor.
Anyway, all these is my take about.
regards and enjoy the music,
R.
