How Does the Soundsmith

You may very well have heard the Voice at RMAF last year in the OMA room. At the time, I was using the cartridge because I thought it was fantastic with the Schroeder Reference on the Saskia slate idler drive turntable, producing the kind of sound I wanted from the OMA system. Now OMA also sells the Voice, so that's my disclaimer.

I've heard the Voice in direct comparison with the Lyra Olympos, Koetsu Coralstone Platinum, and Soundsmith Strain Gauge, all on Schroeder arms, and can assure you that its up there with all of them, despite costing a factor of 3 to 5 times less, which is simply remarkable. And one does not have to deal with issues of MC carts such as properly matching step up transformers. Despite what some other posters in this thread have suggested, the Voice is not only extremely fast due to its very low moving mass, its also tonally correct, and a pleasure to listen to. I would not use words like "easy" or "romantic" to describe it, but natural and accurate. I was never a big fan of moving magnet cartridges before I heard the Voice, but it certainly changed my mind very, very quickly.

I won't even begin to discuss the Zyx...

Jonathan (Oswaldsmill Audio)

Couple of things.

The Schroeder Reference that was used by OMA at RMAF last year (2008) was a medium weight armwand, not a lightweight one. And in fact I have used the Voice with the Schick arm as well, which is better known for compatibility with heavy, low compliance cartridges.

The Voice at RMAF was set up by Frank Schroeder himself, so I don't think that the tweaking thing, spending months getting an arm and cart properly set up, actually applies to the sound in the OMA room last year. The deck was pretty optimal in its set up, and the loading was correct as well. This was not something left to chance, a tt setup done for a show only. Everything was set up long before, back at Oswaldsmill, and I think one could hear that at the show.

Soundsmith is about to release a completely new iteration on the Voice- it will be called the Sussuro. I think its already up on their site. It is a lower compliance, low output version of the technology in the Voice, and really has to be optimized vis loading, but it will be a revelation for many regarding the debate about LOMC vs Moving Iron. I don't think there has ever been a LOMM (low output moving iron) cartridge before this.

Maybe, but I don't know of one.