MC Cartridge Ideas
Looking at your Opera Tonearm i think you can use a wide range of cartridges, but please make sure about effective mass of the tonearm, as i can see you can even swap the arm tube (longer is for lower compliance cartridges). There is a Dynavector KARAT on the image from tonearm manufacturer, this model with very short diamond cantilever must be excellent! I have DV KARAT-17D2 mkII , even previous model was great, i also tried 23RS Ruby and was very impressed. They are not very expensive. Maybe you can ask tonearm manufacturer why he decided to use Dynavector for advertising his tonearm online. |
I actually bought the turntable with the 17D3 Karat, but the cantilever broke a few years back. It was an awesome combo and then I got the xx2 which improved on the bass. Time to get a new cartridge. I see, new cartridge is always good idea. Compliance for KARAT series is 15cu but most likely measured at 100Hz like all Japanese carts? If it was measured at 100Hz then when we convert it to 10Hz is will be about 27cu. For example Koetsu Black compliance is 5cu @ 100Hz (about 8.5 @ 10Hz) and this is very low, another heavier arm tube must be used for such low compliance cartridges. Here is more about tonearm/cartridge resonance |
My present go-to recommendation for cartridge questions, is to call Soundsmith with your system info and budget, and listen very carefully. You will get a quality US made product with a reasonable stylus replacement cost and spectacular imaging. @oldears Peter at SoundSmith is recommending to avoid any MC cartridges in his lectures, none of his own cartridges are MC. His cartridges are Moving Iron, but the OP is asking for LOMC SS carts are definitely the best in terms of service, this is great, but they are not the best cartridges in the world. I will ask Soundsmoth, but would prefer something Japanese. That’s right, Japanese is the way to go. Before you will ask Peter at SoundSmith please watch his lecture. Most likely Peter’s the answer will be SoundSmith cartridge as he’s not a consultant in choosing cartridges from some other manufacturers for anyone. |
I would try a Current injection phono stage . I am very impressed by the 47Labs Phono Cube current injection type phono stage with my FR-7fz cartridge. Which one do you have ? |
