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Sota/Shelter 501mkII - Tonearm Suggestions?

I have a Sota Star/Sapphire table with a Shelter 501mkII cartridge. The tonearm is a Sumiko FT-3. I have about $1500 that I can spend on a new tonearm, and I don't mind buying used.

Of course, I would like the tonearm to sound great, but I would also like something that has a reasonably easy VTA setup.

Can you recommend a tonearm that will match up well with the Sota table and the Shelter 501mkII, that is in my price range?

My other associated equipment is:
XLO Reference Phono Cable
Musical Fidelity XPS-3 Phono Stage
B&W 802D Speakers
Classe CA-M400 MonoblocK amps
dmccombs

Showing 2 responses by dmccombs

dmccombs OP
112 posts
 
Thanks for the comments so far. I appreciate the input.

Which do folks think are better, a SME 309, or an Origin Live Encounter?

My cartridge is the Shelter 501mkII, with a compliance of 9cu. It looks like I need an arm with an effective mass of 12g or more?

Thanks,
Darrell
dmccombs OP
112 posts
 
Thanks for the suggestions. Before the last two suggestions, the comments had leaned towards the Origin or SME. A friend cut me a sweet deal on a Sota Cosmos armboard already cut for an SME, so that swung things to the SME for me.

Last week, I picked up a used SME IV-Vi that was in good shape. I have the arm installed now, and it seems to be a good match with the Sota and Shelter 501.

It takes a couple days to really get the feel of how the arm adjustments work. I think I have it down now and have begun fine tuning.

I can already tell the arm is quiet, and pretty accurate. I like the sound already, but know I need to tweak a little more to get the best sound possible.

This arm/cartridge combo appears to have a resonance frequency of 12 hz. Ideally, this should be between 9-11hz. I used the arm dampening a slight amount to help with this.

Thanks again for the suggestions.

Darrell
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