Recommend an MC cartridge

Reimac, until reading your post, I had never heard of this new Miyajima cartridge that you purchased in Tokyo. I am a little disappointed in myself, because I just returned from almost 3 weeks staying with my son in Tokyo, and I would have loved that experience that you had. so can you please say more about the cartridge? The question that arises is that you can’t just forget about RIAA correction, because all LPs are encoded with the RIAA filter in the first place. So I am wondering if this is what others have called a strain gauge cartridge , and how well it informs to RIAA in the playback. Other companies that market strain gauge cartridges also market, a special gain stage that is said mysteriously to help the output to conform to the RIAA correction algorithm.

When you use the term "optimized", do you refer to consistency of the manufacture of a given model or do you refer to a particular construction (body materials, cantilever type, stylus shape, coils, etc) that you deem to be optimal?

FWIW, I had my Grace Ruby re-tipped by SS using their top line ruby cantilever/OCL stylus option.  When I got it back, suffice to say it did not sound "good".  I notified Peter of my dissatisfaction, and he agreed to have a second look at the installation. Upon receipt, he immediately found the problem (an error on their end, which I did not completely understand, although Peter did explain it to me).  SS fixed their issue and promptly returned the Ruby for no new cost (of course), and voila', the cartridge sounds better by far than a second Grace Ruby I also own, still with its original cantilever and elliptical stylus.  In fact, the re-tipped Ruby is my favorite MM cartridge. So, they made a mistake, admitted the mistake, and fixed the mistake, all done with dignity.