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About Koetsu Rosewood

Hello,

I was given some days ago a Koetsu rosewood cartridge for a test run

in view to buy it for some 1500 usd.

It was the first time that I could hear such an expensive and highly regarded cartridge.

My system is Marantz sc-9 premp (with its very good mc and mm phono inputs) and Marantz sm-9 amplifier. The TT is a Sony TTS-2510.  (I like vintage)

 

I have also a Phasemation ea-200  phono unit which is very good.  And my LS are Cabasse Brigantin 372 (very very good ls which I am very fond of)

I could compare this Koetsu cartridge with some very good (but  much less expensive) cartridges in my collection such as (MC) sony xl-44L, at33ml, victor mc-1, and (MM)  Pioneer PC-600 and Victor X-1E.

Well, what can I say. I liked Koetsu very much. It is an excellent cartridge indeed. Even it can be called perfect sounding cartridge. I noticed well the difference between Koetsu and the other cartridges.

But all that said, I decided not to buy it. Because I did not find that with Koetsu my system would sound so much better. The test (for me) showed not that Koetsu was much better than the others, but than the others were if not equal (of course not) at least also very good and so much less expensive. In that sense the test was in their favour. I prefer to spent money on records J)

That is what I think.

 

Now, I took the photo of the Koetsu needle, and I would like to ask if it is an original needle or retipped but I did not find how to attach a photo to the message ;((( Could anybody tell me ?

 

Thank you very much

 

Serge

serge8

Showing 2 responses by whart

whart's avatar
whart
3,144 posts
 

I don’t know if Audiogon supports images; I always post images here from a third party source, either my own website, or a third party hosting site (some of which, like Flickr, are pretty good and free for a substantial number of images). 

Someone may be able to discern whether a retipped stylus was correctly mounted; I would also want to know if the cartridge was a Sugano Sr. one rather than a later model. As to your conclusions, you did the right thing in terms of listening on your system. I see that the TT you have had a facility to mount a heavier head shell; the Koetsus tend to sound their best in higher mass arms given their low compliance. I enjoy mine--newer stone bodied types, but obviously, different systems, tone arms (I use a modern linear tracker) will yield different results. 

PS: @jasonbourne52 - I’m not sure these cartridges were ever known as monsters at tracking, compared to the something like the old top line Shure V15, but they were certainly highly regarded for their tone and the more modern ones in my experience brought that quality to the frequency extremes, not just the midrange, which was what the Rosewood was known for. 

whart's avatar
whart
3,144 posts
 

I wouldn’t begrudge @ghdprentice for his choice of phono stage or its price, we all have different approaches and budgets. The better question to me is what arm is being used with the Koetsu given the low compliance of the cartridge. You are going to have more energy coming back up the arm from such a cartridge; I gather some folks have fudged by using damping. In my case, it’s horizontal mass on a linear tracker and you could bust me for a spendy arm (but fact is, I’ve had it for years, and us geezers benefit from having bought in early). 

I also didn’t realize that there were multiple Jason Bournes- but I guess in the spy racket, you gotta have a cover. My comment about the tracking test record was directed to @jasonbourne71, not his "double" a/k/a ’Agent 52. 

If you can’t have fun with this, why bother? :)

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