importance of phono cartridge

Dennis,

Do let us know how your new cartridge sounds. I don't know anyone else using an Airy 3 on that rig. You are pioneering for us all.

BTW, what cartridge(s) were you using on the Scout before?

Your PH5's gain is marginal for a .24mv cartridge, so you may not hear all the dynamic punch an Airy 3 has to offer. OTOH, the silver coil ZYX's tend to sound a bit heftier (and warmer) than the copper ones. Hopefully that will help.

I'd try both the 200 and 100 ohm impedance settings on the PH5. Once the cartridge is broken in I'd expect 100 ohms will probably sound best, but of course your ears must be the judge.

Check out my Airy review and the one at 10audio.com for lots of setup and break-in tips and other trivia.

Enjoy!
Doug

To offer another perspective - introducing a reference quality or near reference quality component tends, in my experience, to yield one of two types of effects. Either it will expose up or downstream weaknesses in other gear, or it will let you hear virtues in your system that previously you may have missed. Once your system gets to a certain level of audio happiness I've find the latter is more often the case.

Imo given an approximate level of comparable quality across your system to start with, the components that are more likely to offer orders of magnitude improvement to the system overall (not simply old vs. new component) can be grouped as follows: group 1: TT, phonostage/linestage, and speakers; group 2: tonearm, amplifier, cartridge; group 3: everything else. Of course there are no hard and fast rules and YMMV - this is just my experience, and assumes whatever is the upgrade it is somewhat synergistic with the whole.

A reference quality component is one around which you can build a system, is likely to be less transient (you'll have it for a while), and helps you gauge the value and influence of changing other system components. Imo, one can build a system around any of the components in group 1. And, again, imo, the TT is *a* great place to start, but it is not inherently *the* best or only place to start. Swapping out a preamp/phonostage for a substantially better one can have just as dramatic - and sometimes greater - overall effect as swapping out a TT for a substantially better one. Again - this assumes that your system is relatively well balanced to start with. Cheers! Tim

I must thank every one for the wealth of knowledge and willingness to share and educate newbies like myself. Just got back into vinyl and look forward everyday to reading the posts in this forum. Life has not been the same I must say. Vinyl spinning has become a daily habit.

I have a VPI Scoutmaster with a Benz Ace M with VPI TT cables on a gingko cloud 11, VPI SDS and Acoustech PH1P phono stage on a gingko cloud 10, all sitting on a Target wall shelf. Phonostage has about a 45 ft run to a Lexicon MC12B V4 and amp is a Sherbourn and speakers are Mirage Frx-9s with Velodyne F-1200R and HGS-15 subs. Listen to music 80% and HT 20%.

Would like suggestions on how to get the best out of my system. To my ears, sounds great but also know I probably have weak points.

I am considering the new VPI Signature JMW-9 arm and maybe an excellent cartridge to go with it. Any suggestions will be most helpful.

Would like to know what would be perfect cartridge for the scoutmaster. Have no intentions of changing TT's so I am stuck with the JMW-9's it seems.

I apologize for the long winded post. Thank you everyone in advance.

My list

1.Turntable + setup
2.Arm + arm/turntable compatibility + setup
3.Stand + setup
4.Phonostage
5.Cartridge + cartridge/arm/phonostage compatibility + setup
6.Phonocable

Dynavector Karat,Linn Klyde or VdH MC1 are all the real high-end system needs if pp.1-4,amplification,speakers,cables and acoustics are up to the task.

>> Have no intentions of changing TT's so I am stuck with the JMW-9's it seems.<<

Reconsider changing the table/arm. This is your weak link and offers you the biggest opportunity to improve your system. Valhalla wire (yuk) and the other "Signature" tweaks do not change the fact that this is an average, at best, tonearm. You will never hear what better cartridges have to offer in this arm.
It's your money.