Setting VTA on a new Shelter 901?

Noel,

901, apparently due to its geometry, is very sensitive for VTA. The people who report opposite are just have low discrimination playback systems or hearing. The 901 yields the best result around 1.7-1.9 and for each mass it would require own very precise VTA setting. Unfortunately, due to luck of precise unified VTA measurement, no one would be able to tell you an absolute values for a specific mass. You have to plays with it. The Playing Cards method is very useful however it would not necessary work with 901. The “standart” playing cards are too thick for the 901’s VTA sensitively and you will eventually find the 17 cards is too high but 16 cards it too low… You may search for the thinner cards or to tape on some of the cards 0.1 mm tape (as I do)… Also, you might discover in future that to set VTA according to the system tonal balance (bright, warmth, break-up that happens on crescendos and so on…) is not correct way to search for a correct VTA... Good luck.

Rgs,
Romy the Cat

PS: posted despite a great opportunity that the post will be vandalized by the local “administration”…

Primary by “imaging” (it very loaded word), x-force generating, dynamics, some dynamic qualities of dynamics, articulation, musical accents, musical time distortions and so on. Do not forget that when you balance VTA tonally you make your cartridge to cure the imperfections of the rest of your system but you should not care about a “crappy” system but only about the cartridges-record interface. A properly assembled, tonally neutral system will accidentally (?) yield a proper tonal balance in the same VTA point where the optimum “imagingabilety” (along with the rest parameters) would be reached (actually they all come together into one single point). In many instances for some people it is difficult to understand the “imaging” results because they deceived by the tonal distortions but with a certain experience and, the most important, with an ability to interpret results it is perfectly possible. Tonal accurateness is very tricky, mostly misunderstood by audiophile awareness, abused and generally non-essential part of audio reproduction... :-(

Rgs,
Romy The Cat

Viridian, I do not think you disagree with the “imagingability concept” but rather you’re trying to expand the said. Yes, at the correct VTA setting the surface noise become the orders of magnitude less annoying but this it not a reason but a consequence of something else. When “imaging” (as a correct PATTERN of phase randomonization) kicks in; when the X-force (I intentionally left without explanation what it is) embraces the musical messages and opens a communicative bridge between a musical event and a reproduced Reality; and when some other parameters of sound reproduction are set “correctly” then a specific mechanism get activated that tune a listener’s consciousness out of the external irritators and make the surface noise “reproduced in a different plane”. So, a minimization of noise is a process that flows out of something else. Besides, there are many other ingredients that affect a perception of a surface noise… There are some phonostages (assumedly they all have equalized input R and C) that make a cartridge to reach the best imagingability (Please, remember I said that “imaging” was VERY loaded word) and a less-annoying “plane” of surface noise at the different points/heights (there are some mechanism how a noise reduction could be done inappropriately-electronically) However, there is no free lunch and along with noise reduction those phonostages fuck up something else musically. I have seen those examples again and again…. So, what I propose is that the noise flipping in a different “plane” is one of the properties of the “Correct VTA” but this is not NECESSARY THE SIGN that a cartridge is in the correct VTA point.