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Ortofon Red/Pro-ject Carbon Debut combination; rolled off hi-frequencies. Solutions?

Hi there.

I just bought a Project Carbon Debut SB with a factory equipped Ortofon Red. After 30 hours break-in the mids are fine (smooth, rich and full), bass is a little fat but tolerable but the highs, as I expected were rolled off; but more than I expected and not acceptable to me. Obviously, there will be compromises in a "bargain" turntable but mechanically and sonically I think it's good basic platform to start with.
 
The TT is playing back through the inboard phono stage of my Musical Fidelity A3.2 integrated. I've swapped interconnects, starting with Audioquest Diamondback (nice mids, darker top end) and Wireworld Equinox 6's (brighter top but not much inprovement in air, and surprisingly a bit grainy and obscure in the mids).

I'm thinking my 1st step is upgrading the cartridge to either the Ortofon Blue, Shelter 201 of the new Audio Technica VM540ML; the replacement for the old AT400ML which was a bit too bright but otherwise highly musical and faithful in reproduction (I had one in my Music Hall MMF5.1) but there aren't any reviews of it to be found on the web or in hi-fi mags.

I am on a budget and before I start throwing hundreds of bucks around and burning months of experimentation on swapping out cables, outboard phono stages and cartridges I thought I'd throw this subject open to discussion to my brothers of the cloth who have the same high fidelity point of view as I.

Any recommendations or opinions are welcome. 


morbius2130aol

Showing 1 response by invictus005

invictus005
597 posts
 
2M Red is an excellent entry level cartridge. I had several of them and they did not lack detail. When I hear "lack of detail" the first thing that comes to mind is VTA.

Make sure your VTA is set correctly. With tracking force set at 1.8g (and verified with a gauge), set the arm down on an average thickness record and make sure the tonearm tube is parallel to the record's surface.

Sometimes this may may be hard to see. You can take cardstock paper, slightly narrower than the white line drawn in the center of your arm tube. Draw thin lines spread 1mm apart using a sharp pencil and ruller. Then gently and flatly place this piece of paper on the record's surface and prop it against the tonearm. 

Parallel should give you the best detail and bass and have an SRA of 90-92 degrees. Tonearm's tail too far down will result in muddy thick sound. Tail too far up can sound bright and sibilant. 

I don't believe your turntable has an easy VTA adjustment, so you'll have to get creative with shims, etc. 
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