I am a year into my journey down the audio rabbit hole. I am enjoying all the incremental gains and enduring the miss fires. My system is as follows:
Rogue Audio Sphinx V2 Fluance RT85 with Ortofon Blue Epicure M150's completely rebuilt with kit from Hue at Human Speaker.
I am trying to figure out the next step on my journey. I am considering the next steps.
1- send the Rogue back to be upgraded to V3 which has a much better phono stage($500) 2- switch to a MM in the $500-$750 range 3- switch to a MC cartridge 4- add a seperate phono stage under $1500 5- add a subwoofer to the party
I want to pick the one option that will give me the most improvement for the money.
Thank you in advance for weighing in with you knowledge and opinions.
The Ortofon BLUE is the weakest part in your system. Everything starts from the cartridge in analog setup, this cartridge is too bad, the stylus tip is elliptical, this is very close to the Red (the cheapest model).
I am going to upgrade the Rogue and enjoy for a while. Looks like speakers or a better integrated will be the future debate.
Why do you think your MM phono stage is not good ?
All you have to do is to change a cartridge, nothing else in your system. This is where you can get the biggest upgrade for the lowest possible cost. You can’t buy a phono stage for $500-700 but you can buy superb cartridge for $500-700.
If you will start from the phono stage you will not get there, just a waste of money until you don’t have a proper cartridge with advanced stylus profile and better cantilever. Read about stylus profile here.
Speakers - yes, very important, but even with the best speakers you need a great cartridge first, because the signal path starts from the vinyl groove and only a stylus can pick up the signal right.
You can completely change the whole sound of your analog system spending $500-700 on a cartridge. There is no other component in analog chain that will give you this for the same amount.
And i want to remind you that a life span of your elliptical stylus is pretty short and soon you will have to change it anyway and the price just for the stylus will be high. You’d better invest in a cartridge with the greatest profile like Shibata, LineContact, MicroLine, Stereohedron, MicroRidge that you can use for a much longer time.
Guy's your wearing me down I'll say it again. Start with a room that has been treated acoustically otherwise you'll be chasing your tail. I assume since the OP didn't mention any that he's still dealing with whatever is going on there. Once treated as far as you care to implement, then start with gear changes.
Both rooms I've used for music were substantially improved and allowed me to differentiate between how the room sounds versus the gear. It took me awhile to become a room treatment prognosticator but I wish it had occurred much earlier in my journey. Great gear in a so so room will still be so so unfortunately.
I really appreciate all the input. I think I understand that some of my options may have diminishing returns and probobly waiting until I am ready to drop a larger chunk of cash is a better strategy. I am really enjoying the journey and honestly think my set up sounds pretty good for the money I have put in. I am going to upgrade the Rogue and enjoy for a while. Looks like speakers or a better integrated will be the future debate.
I will say that the better my music sounds the more I want to listen. My music listening time has doubled a day since I have improved my setup. Tv is an afterthought. I am fortunate that my wife loves music too. It helps her Dad has a $50k plus system.
You will always get your biggest upgraded from speakers Iam a fan of Vandersteens started with 2ce sig II now I have Quatros I also owned a Rogue Cronus mag Rogue and Vandersteens work good together Vandersteen just came out with a new model 2 you might be able to fine a deal on the last model 2
Have you used this Raven amp that you always recommend? Why do you think
it is so special over many other amps that are on the market?
I have a stellar record when it comes to figuring out what is good based on reviews and comments. Read willgolf, he had a Reflection MkII. Then watch this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gcd76DZmbdY
Chakster, that article is from 1994. I think you need to catch your breath, relax, get stoned and listen to music for the sheer enjoyment of it. Modern moving coil’s moving systems have much lower effective mass than back then. That old high end peak is long gone. Phono amps have also made great strides. The very best cartridges are MC.
@mijostyn I have many LOMC cartridges and many different phono stages and SUTs and Headamps in my studio, so I am able to compare everything myself. The golden age of analog is NOT today, it was in the 80’s on its peak (for cartridges, turntables, reel to reel, speakers ). Actually for the speakers it happened earlier.
I owned two 681EEs and the Charisma run circles around them. It also tracks better by a wide margin. So Chakster, saying modern MM cartridges can not compete with old ones is patently wrong.
681EE is not even close to the best Stanton cartridges, because the stylus tip is Elliptical, the best Stanton/Pickering are all have Stereohedron and Stereohedron mkII diamonds (the greatest profiles in the history). Cartridge in the TAS article is 881s (Stereohedron) is not the top model, there are also Technics 100c mk4 and Audio-Technics AT-ML170 and those two might be better than Stanton 881s for someone (personal preferences).
I hope you can buy this new TOP WING to tell us how good it is, the price is just about $12500 for this MI, i’m sure you will like it. Especially when they will charge crazy amount for re-tip.
I would be willing to bet that there is no vintage MM cartridge that can compete with the Charisma never mind Grado and Soundsmith. They just did not have the materials science then that we do now.
You never tried the best vintage MM or MI, let’s face it first. They had better materials not even available today for cartridge manufacturers like Beryllium for example, I just don’t want to repeat it all over again.
But having all those "ultra nano" materials today why only a few manufacturers can make a decent sounding tubes ? Tube are much simpler design than a phono cartridge, but many people prefer NOS from the 40's/50's than brand new tubes.
Just compare the size of the Charisma’s diamond to that of the 681EE. It is easily 1/4 the size. The 681EE cantilever is a baseball bat in comparison.
Why are you refering to 681EE, compare your cartridge to 981 or SC-100 WOS and you will hear the most involving sound ever.
681EEE is entry level model, Stanton made so many models, some of them are cheap crap with conical styli.
Now maybe vintage cartridges are better than modern ones at the same price point, I can’t say.
Exactly I want to remind you that OP asked for an "MM in the $500-$750 range " ! Not $2000
But, the Charisma runs in another universe. It also costs $2000.00 which brings another subject to mind. If you can make a cartridge with the same cantilever and diamond as a $16,000 cartridge for $2000.00 why does that cartridge cost so much??
I have no idea, got too many vintage MM cartridges with Boron Pipe cantilevers, Sapphire or Ruby, Titanium or Ceramic cantilevers. Some of them are $700, some of them are $3000 today.
IMHO the best MC cartridge you can buy is the Ortofon Windfeld Ti price considered. Add a Clearaudio Charisma and you have the best of both worlds.
I have an Ortofon MC 2000 new in the box, very special LOMC cartridge. The Clear Audio is buying cartridge generators from Audio-Technica. I already have the best Audio-Technica MM ever made (the AT-ML180 PC-OCC with Gold-Plated Beryllium cantilever, later replaced with Gold-Plated Boron cantilever).
MM cartridges designed way back and the ClearAudio is nothing in this world of the best MM.
I gave you the link to $12500 Coreless-flux modern Ultra High-End MI cartridge from the Japanese brand Top Wing, do you know this brand? Recommended by Jonathan Carr a few years ago on audiogon. The engineer of the Top Wing used to work for the Grace back in the days. The Grace cartridges are amazing (F14 and LEVEL II series).
Take any advice you like best from this smorgasbord, but don't spend money on Synergistic Research tweaks, as Millercarbon suggests you do. Most of those tweaks are "controversial", at best, in terms of actual benefits. I am not saying categorically that they are worthless (although that is my private opinion), I am saying that such items are best reserved for those in a more advanced stage of audiophilia and system development. First, learn what you like and what it takes to get your system to a point where you are generally satisfied. I wouldn't be so bold as to tell you how to do that, because I have no idea what you are seeking SQ-wise. After that, maybe think about PHTs and HFTs and the like, marketed by SR. Their only saving grace is you can return them for full refund within an allotted time period.
Would I get any noticeable benefit from going from the $230 ortofon blue
to a $750 ortofon black(also upgrading the rogue)?
Of course you will. The beauty of "everything matters" is no matter what you improve, its improved, and you will hear it.
The question for me then becomes, so what makes the most sense to improve? Almost never its a component upgrade. Because almost always there's something much cheaper like a cone or other tweak or mod that will get you at least as much net improvement without the net cost hassle of losing depreciation value and the hassle of selling.
Plus the longer you wait between components the more time for technology to actually improve. Speakers improved so much my $16k Talon Khorus were replaced with much better Tekton Moabs that cost me hardly anything net but are leagues better performance. You may not want to hang onto anything 16 years but you get the idea. Its better to save up and make great strides than baby steps.
In the mean time its not like you're standing still. One little piece of fO.q tape stuck anywhere on your arm will make about as much improvement as you'll hear between those carts you're considering. Maybe more. One little piece. The whole sheet costs $70. By the time you get done finding places to use all that tape, let me know if you don't think its easily ten times the price in improvements. Tweaks are like that. HFT are like that.
Wait a few months
and upgrade my integrated?
If you upgrade to a Raven that will be huge. Mega. Best of all will put you in a place you can pretty much forget about amps for years and years. By the time you tweak it out real good it will be hard to find anything better for less than a house.
Also Raven is supposed to be coming out with new improved versions this fall. I'm hoping for something like a Black Friday sale for an Osprey.
But that's me. You have to be you. Maybe you get so much from the pleasure of having something new its worth it to be getting something new all the time. Its not just about knowing components, you know. Its also about knowing yourself.
I actually haven’t heard the bronze with the Rogue. I currently have a blue and it sounds great. I plan to upgrade to the bronze when that needs to be replaced. If you have the $$ just get the black, but I think the bronze is a good compromise if the blue isn’t cutting it for you.
That being said, your system is only as good as it’s weakest link, so you don’t need a Ferrari cart if you have Honda speakers, amp, etc.
Regarding the upgrade to V3, it’s worth it just for the phono, it sounds fantastic and you can tweak the sound by rolling the tubes as needed. It’s probably not going to stand up to a 1k stand alone preamp, but it’s certainly the best integrated phono I’ve heard. If you’re not planning on using the phono section, it’s probably not worth the effort to upgrade (maybe if you use headphones).
Chakster, that article is from 1994. I think you need to catch your breath, relax, get stoned and listen to music for the sheer enjoyment of it. Modern moving coil's moving systems have much lower effective mass than back then. That old high end peak is long gone. Phono amps have also made great strides. The very best cartridges are MC. Problem is they cost an arm and a leg. Having said this, about a month ago I got a wild hair and purchased a Charisma V2 from Elusive Disc (a REALLY great crew.) I have not had a MM cartridge for 30 odd years and this cartridge had uniformly great reviews. The Charisma has the same stylus and cantilever as the mighty (expensive) Goldfinger. While not the last word in detail it has an authority that only a few MC cartridges can match. If Rock and Jazz are your thing this is your cartridge. It will easily out perform any MC with step up device in its price range. Wild guess is you would have to spend $6K to beat it. I owned two 681EEs and the Charisma run circles around them. It also tracks better by a wide margin. So Chakster, saying modern MM cartridges can not compete with old ones is patently wrong. I would be willing to bet that there is no vintage MM cartridge that can compete with the Charisma never mind Grado and Soundsmith. They just did not have the materials science then that we do now. Just compare the size of the Charisma's diamond to that of the 681EE. It is easily 1/4 the size. The 681EE cantilever is a baseball bat in comparison. Now maybe vintage cartridges are better than modern ones at the same price point, I can't say. But, the Charisma runs in another universe. It also costs $2000.00 which brings another subject to mind. If you can make a cartridge with the same cantilever and diamond as a $16,000 cartridge for $2000.00 why does that cartridge cost so much?? What is left is just magnets and wire. So the Goldfinger is gold. Add $2000.00 for the gold and the diamond. Where is the other $12,000? The answer is two different markets. You charge whatever that market will bear. MM buyers are obviously more frugal and they obviously get more for their money. So, what does that say about MC buyers? They are obviously willing to pay more for less. IMHO the best MC cartridge you can buy is the Ortofon Windfeld Ti price considered. Add a Clearaudio Charisma and you have the best of both worlds.
Cartridge is the key to a perfect sound on any turntable. Cartridges are copatible if you're not switching from superheavy tonearm to a lightweight tonearm. All modern tonearms are mostly mid mass and nearly all modern cartridges are mid compliance. No matter what turntable, you need a decent cartridge anyway. And a great cartridge is NOT the most expensive one.
Mickey33_1 Thank you for the response. I should have clarified that I would upgrade and replace cartridge OR wait a few months and switch integrateds. I really love my Rogue and when I switched from my Onkyo to the Sphinx it was such a change. I found a ortofon bronze for a great price but have read reviews that some like the blue better. Have you heard the Bronze with your sphinx? I will eventually upgrade speakers. When I rebuilt these original EPI M150's it was another "ahha" moment. The speaker I was looking at before I rebuilt was the Wharfedale Linton Heritige. I love old school speakers and they have such a great look. Harbeth look great but not quite ready to drop $6000 on speakers yet.
MM cartridge is excellent for all kind of music and if you really want true reproduction without coloration then you have to buy an MM cartridge, but not that modern crap, you need a classic MM cartridge from the golden age, with advanced stylus profile on it, and tons of fans worldwide, I mean people who really understand what is a good MM cartridge (not what reviewers telling them these days). The problem with modern MM is very simple: manufacturers are not competing with each other to make the best sounding MM anymore, vinyl is not the main format and they can sell an average MC for much higher prices (almost 10 times higher price than MM) and this is where they are using exotic materials sometimes to justify the cost.
Read this article from the archive of the TAS magazine and I hope it will help you to understand why MM is better. See which MM cartridge has been using by professionals for disk mastering, see which one sound like master tape. Check what is Stanton/Pickering’s Stereohedron stylus tip:
"Stereohedron stylus can be used for 1000 hrs. We recommend checking your stylus every 250 hrs. Like its cousin, the Quadrahedral, the STEREOHEDRON stylus is shaped to provide an enlarged area of record groove contact, while providing the ability to accurately trace the high frequency, the level modulations found on today’s records, thus, the Stereohedron stylus provides superior performance which low stylus wear and low record wear for your stereo records. This cartridge will perform superbly not only with stereo, but with four-channel matrix derived systems (SQ, QS, etc). "
...And buy yourself a NOS (New Old Stock) Pickering XSV/4000 cartridge for $750, you will not find anything better than this spending money on MC and then on re-tipping of MC. I collect all top Pickering and Stanton models of MM cartridges and I have some of the best LOMC too. Let me tell you that Stanton 981 or SC100 WOS is the best you can get for the money and Pickering XSV/4000 or XSV/5000 are amazing.
As far as i know, chronologically, Pickering XUV/4500Q with Quadrahedron stylus for CD-4 records was the predecessor of the Stereohedron series. The first Stereohedron series was the XSV/3000 model. Reading an old review I noticed that Stereohedron was preferable over Quadrahedron for stereo records. In other words even XSV/3000 was better than XUV/4500Q. The next cartridge from Pickering surpassed them all! It was an improved XSV/4000 Stereohedron series with lower stylus tip mass, higher compliance and wider frequency response. The Stereohedron stylus is a modified stereo version of the Quadrahedron stylus. The XSV/4000 plays all stereo and mono records with consummate ease, which certainly speaks well for the Stereohedron stylus principle. The Stereohedron has a large bearing surface which is distributed over a large portion of the modulated groove, and at the stated optimum tracking force of 1.2 grams, the actual force per unit area is, of course, much less and should significantly contribute to the longevity of recordings.
I really love Pickering and Stanton top models, but there are some other great MM or MI on the market, it will take too much time to post about all of them again. Read and search audiogon. Send me direct message if you need help.
P.S. Once you get an MC you’re hooked, when the stylus is worn you can’t replace it yourself, you must send your MC to the manufacturer or to someone else. The manufacturer will charge over 60% of the full retail price again.
If you want to hear something very different you don’t have to change from one cartridge to another with the same manufacturer, you can always try something very different (another cartridge like MM versus MC). User replaceable stylus is great option (available only for MM/MI).
As a fellow Rogue owner (V3) with upgraded tubes, I would recommend the following upgrade options:
1. Upgrade your Rogue to V3. Change the tubes (Brimars from upscale audio or equivalent). Upgrade the stylus to Ortofon Bronze (black is better but you’ll save money and the bronze is noticebly better than the blue). Pair with Warfedale Linton Heritage Speakers (or Harbeth if you wanna spend more)
2. Don’t invest in upgrading the Rogue (For only a few months), get the Raven (or Prima Luna etc), Ortofon Black, and equivalent speakers.
Thanks Millercarbon and Mijostyn. I had a feeling I might get that response. I am definitely interested in Raven audio as a future upgrade but not right now. I am glad to get some clarity on MC cartridges. Would I get any noticeable benefit from going from the $230 ortofon blue to a $750 ortofon black(also upgrading the rogue)? Wait a few months and upgrade my integrated?
cpd, I would be inclined to upgrade your Rogue. If you listen to more dynamic music like Rock and Jazz you will not like switching to an inexpensive MC cartridge. MM cartridges are more dynamic and generally do better at the lower price levels. They will track better than inexpensive MC's Consider a MC cartridge once you are ready to spend 2 grand. Subwoofers are great but you will need at least two. One just does not make it. Also you will need an active crossover with a high pass filter for your main amp. The crossover that come with the subs are IMHO pretty bad. Consider subwoofers when you are ready to spend about 4 grand.
All the options you're considering have one thing in common: they are all spending money on expendable components you will inevitably lose money on when it comes time to upgrade.
Things that will improve your system as much or more without ever losing any money because they will be used wherever you go forever: Synergistic Research HFT, ECT, PHT, Cable Elevators, BDR Cones.
You are getting into a range where with some wise decisions its possible to find extremely high value components in the $3k to $5k range. That may seem like a lot, 2x to 4x what you're talking about. But really all it means is spreading it out over a longer period of time. This patience is rewarded by getting you into Koetsu, Raven, Herron, Tekton territory.
You mention a sub. A sub is a bad idea. A DBA, four subs, is a terrific idea. For around $3k you can have SOTA bass. Most of us with a DBA are set for life. No desire to upgrade. How many can say that about their bass??? So a sub could be a good idea- if its phase one of four.
Anyway that's my advice. Extract the most from what you have first, and only then look to upgrade what you have. See: mahgister.
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