Another Pro-Ject Debut Carbon DC with Ortofon 2M Red Question

This is all very subjective, in my opinion you have to continue with MM or MI if you don’t want more troubles often associated with MC (such as loading on the phono stage, very low output of the cartridge and many more). Use a cartridge with user replaceable stylus, make sure your cartridge has better stylus profile than Elliptical if you want to improve the sound quality.

And if you want something different do not limit yourself with one brand, it’s not necessary to buy next Ortofon model, the difference will be ONLY the stylus shape.

At lower price under $450 i really like Stanton and Pickering cartridges.
It’s hard to find anything better (and i tried over 50 different MM/MI samples). This one is perfect for your tonearm. This is NOS (from 1994). If you have higher budget this is my favorite. Curious to know more? Good artricle about it.

In addition i found this image. Stanton 681EEE is much cheaper model, but it’s nice to read that it was reference at Trutone disc cutting. It’s hard to read from the image, but this is what is written:

"Trutone can be described as family experience... what a family! Father Lou Rowatti is the president, Son Carl is Vice President and Chief Engineer, and daughter-in-law Adrianne handles the business... Trutone Records in Northvale, New Jersey always uses the Calibrated Stanton cartridges for A-B comparisons between tape and disc. They also use Stanton cartridge to check the frequency response of the cutter head (they will record a 1000Hz tone and 10Hz tone twice a day to check the condition of the cutting stylus and the high end frequency response of the cutter head). They make test cuts and play them back, using Stanton for reference, as high as 15kHz all the way down to 30Hz. Carl Rowatti says: "We use Stanton calibrated Cartridges as out total point of reference in out dist mastering operation." I will add from myself that one of the best Stanton cartridges ever made in not 681EEE but the CS-100 W.O.S.

Anyway you can check the whole Stanton catalog here. 

My first question would be ... why would you be putting a $500 cartridge on a $400 turntable?

The numbers is nothing, what you want to hear is SOUND, if you want a better sound start with better cartridge, this is one and only thing that actually "read" the groove physically. It is true that with Ortofon M2 Red you will never hear a great sound, no matter which turntable you’re using (it’s an entry level cartridge with bonded diamond).

It’s nice to upgrade a turntable too (something like direct drive new technics sl1200gr maybe), but with limited budget, and strong desire to upgrade the sound, a cartridge with advanced LineContact type profile (like Stereohedron) is more important and i’ve heard what a better cartridge can do on this particular turntable (a friend own it and using with Stanton 881s mkII, it was $350 cartridge btw, he literally throw away his new Ortofon M2 Red after we mounted Stanton 881s mkII).