2. analog
  3. 152336-117192

shibata or microline, pls respond ONLY if you specifically have tried both.

I only want to hear FIRST hand experience, not lecturing please.

These two seem too confusing to me.  I have a VM540ML AT cartridge and cannot decide whether Shibata or Microline is better.  AGAIN, PLS DO NOT LECTURE ME ABOUT **OTHER** EXPENSIVE CARTRIDGES.

To me obviously the music quality matters.  However, I also give a lot of importance to how durable one stylus over the other one is AND very importantly, which one is easier (less finnicky) to set up.  Also, it is important that the stylus does not degrade the vinyl excessively.

If you tell me an elliptical is easiest to set up but is 10% less musical, I would probably go with that too.

So.... any ACTUAL experience with either of these two styli ?

Thanks

cakyol

Showing 1 response by larryi

larryi
4,273 posts
 
Whatever you choose, inspect the cartridge out of the box to make sure that the stylus is perfectly aligned to have no azimuth tilt when installed.  As mijostyn mentioned, you can change tilt slightly by raising or lowering the arm (because of the offset of the headshell), but, I have found that these narrow profile styli are particularly sensitive to rake angle setting in terms of the sound.  

I have no idea which intrinsically sounds better--I generally choose a narrow profile stylus because of their reputation for longevity and gentle treatment of the records, but, I have not specifically tried to discern audible differences.  
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