Testing a MC phono cartridge

@yeti42

Many moons ago a technician tested my Dynavector 23RS using an ohmmeter. And yes it did survive. He most likely used a 100K resistor like @imhififan recommended!

I have a new Kiseki Purple Heart that may have lost one channel in transportation.

How do you know it lost one channel without playing it? Best way to test is swap the leads from one channel to other and play it for testing, if the dead channel follow the swap you know there’s a dead channel.

If you want to use an ohmmeter for testing continuity, better add a 100kΩ resistor in series to prevent damage to the coil of a low output mc cart!

1. You will need an ohmmeter to do this test!
2. Remove any wires connected to the cartridge. You will test at the pins on the rear of the cartridge.
3. Set the ohmmeter so it can read up to 10,000 ohms.
4. Connect the ohmmeter leads to the white pin (L) and the blue pin (LG). The meter should read above 100 ohms and below 10,000 ohms.
5. Connect the ohmmeter leads to the red pin (R) and the green pin (RG). The meter should read between 100 ohms and below 10,000 ohms. The ohm reading should be the about the same as step #3 above.
6. Connect the ohmmeter leads to the white pin and the red pin. The meter should read "infinity" or "open".
7. Connect the ohmmeter leads to the blue pin and the green pin. The meter should read "infinity" or "open".

8. 
   If you get different results, the cartridge might have an internal defect. If you get similar results to the the numbers listed above, the cartridge is OK and the problem lies after the cartridge output.