gofar99 Messages: 1917 Registered: May 2010 Location: Southern Arizona
Illuminati (5th Degree)
Hi, Actual cartridge measurements are not simple. The only way that I know of that works fairly well is to use a test record. I use the Analogue Productions Ultimate Test LP. I admit to being a serious vinyl enthusiast and what I do is likely well above typical. I use the LP to test individual cartridge/tonearm/turntable combinations. I take the output from the cartridge and feed it to a Simaudio LP3 preamp. It is extremely linear and quiet, just not musical IMO. That in turn feeds a dual trace oscilloscope. It is PC based and I can get all sorts of information from it. I find that some combinations work better than others and going back to the issue of stylus shape and construction there is no real correlation in my tests as to the type when you get to elliptical and higher and how it actually is mounted. Not much difference in MM vs MI either. Then to be honest I have only mid to high end cartridges/arms and turntables. I do find that that the arm needs to be of the right mass range for the cartridge and the tracking force, anti skating and alignment need to be spot on. My two favorite combinations are a Grado Sonata II in an Origin Live arm on my Empire 598. The second one is a Dynavector Ruby Karat23MR-RS in a Jelco arm on a much modified DIY player that uses the drive system of a Dual 701. I use a Pro-ject Align It to set the alignments and a digital scale to set the tracking force. Anti skating is via the listed test method above.
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