Tonearms: Ripoff?

Tom Port of Better Records recommends the Triplanar and uses one.  My SME IV also has great bass, probably not as good as the Triplanar though.

Went from a  MG-1.1 Air bearing Linear Tracking Tonearm to a THALES Simplicity II...same Lyra Skala cartridge.

Won't be going back anytime soon!!! lol

I really like the Thales concept.  Does it have a similar sound as the SME IV or V is the question?   I wonder if the bass is as robust with those narrow arms and more delicate looking rear assembly.  Otherwise, I prefer it to the VPI unipivot arms.

This has tread has sure created some Nastiness ,
over opinions about the cost of tonearms over $1000.00
being a " rip-off " .
I have stated that I don't think they are ,
one might argue that the  Profit Margins  on higher end tonearms
( equipment ) are excessive .

Elizabeth , I disagree with you about the " haves " ruining the hobby .
I believe that they help all levels of music lovers by not only stimulating
the continued advancement with their money but also with simulating the second and third markets for average income audiophiles .
At one time all of my equipment had been pre-owned ,
thanks to people who can afford to buy the latest and greatest .

So, there's a few Durand arms that've come up today. One is a Talea for $5k, and the other is a Telos for $14k -- setting aside the Telos which this guy is asking for an amount that costs more than my enitre vinyl rig including the $1k I just spent on a Hashimoto SUT -- the Talea at $5k seems to be a huge amount for what you're getting. Let's say I drop the seller down to $4.5k...what am I getting with this arm that the $3.5k Helius Omega Silver Ruby with cryo silver wiring won't give me? Or the 3k for the Clearaudio Universal with VTA? I like the Universal because it looks cool, but it's offputting there's no reviews of it out there.

BTW, Durand also sells a record weight for $3.5k.....

All the reviews like Rega tonearms, they also like Rega TT's; so if you want to listen to music, as opposed to playing with audio toys, that are very easy to mess up, why not use the arm that comes with the table; for example, Basis likes Vector; they must be a match.

I never post, just lurk. Multiple people have noted that this is a troll thread, and yet folks keep banging their heads against the wall trying to win an unwinnable argument with the OP. I dare you all to stop posting in this thread. Betcha can't do it.

Nope, I can't. I'm just glad no one has stated that they all sound the same. 

When are the Moderators going to ban the Op from posting for 1 Year!

Same old positions as usual on this thread, as on the thread I started about the cartridge nightmare. Plenty of people who don’t like the questions and positions posed by the OP ( for whatever biased reasons that they have)- and so they resort to the old retort..you’re a ’troll’. That is so old and weak!

Are tonearms a rip off...yes they are IF they are doing nothing special for the sound, are poorly designed and made, and they are being sold at a huge inflated price. OTOH, IME,most decently designed tonearms are actually either more resolving than what they replace, or more capable in one way or another...bass control, high frequency air and ability to control the cartridge tracking. Unlike cartridges and my OP on the nightmare cartridge thread, I think the opportunity and likelihood of at least hearing a tonearm under consideration is much greater. Leading to a more defined, and in all likelihood, acceptable result once acquired., IMHO.

A bit more resolving (or not) just for extra $10k (or even extra $50k) compared to the Technics EPA-100 mkII, Fidelity-Research FR-64fx and FR-64s, Lustre GST-801, Micro Seiki MAX series and many more highly regarded vintage high-end toneamrs.  

When funds allow, I'll get the RB 2000 tonearm, which is listed at $2,195.


          https://www.needledoctor.com/Rega-RB2000-Tonearm


          http://www.rega.co.uk/rb2000.html


The reason I'll get this tonearm is because it comes with the Rega RP10 which is my next TT.


If I wanted to play with something, I would have gone into electric model trains; I want to hear beautiful music reproduced in my listening room as good as possible. The pinnacle of success in my book is to feel as though you are at a concert when you are in your listening room, and I will take all shortcuts available to get there.

The "haves" are not ruining this hobby, they are helping to fund it. Just think about it; if you had a reputation for a good product, and you could build a slighter better product and charge an obscene price for it, that was way over your acceptable profit margin; "Why not".

Conrad Johnson is my favorite preamp, and here are some prices. When inflation is taken into consideration, they're probably not too high.



    http://www.thestereoshop.com/conradJohnson.php

Finally, the two 'rip off' threads have joined forces. Now the ugly truth can be revealed. Huh? Well, it seems that judgement calls about the 'value' of tonearms and MC cartridges as isolated items are not very useful. The synergy between tonearm and cartridge (or lack thereof) can be 'make or break', so perhaps we should view them as 'one component' within the system.

For all sorts of reasons I don't like 'ranking order lists', but might make an exception for a list of the best 'tonearm / cartridge combinations'. I don't think this has ever been tried, but with all the experience on this forum it could actually be pulled off. It would provide useful information for anyone starting out on this journey and prevent the sort of mistakes that fuel those useless 'rip off' debates.

We should probably start the easy way by listing combinations from one brand or designer, which would suggest that the synergy has been conciously built into them. There were 'made for each other'. Some obvious examples are:
Ortofon RM-309 + Ortofon SPU series
EMT 997 + EMT TSD-15
Fidelity Research FR-64S + Fidelity Research FR-7 series

I only have personal experience with the FR synergy, which is most certainly there. But I assume the other combinations have something similar going for them. I'm only a beginner at this 'cart rolling', but I can already mention three example that I've stumbled on by chance. Of course these are the most exciting discoveries:
Audiocraft AC-4400 + Ortofon MC-5000
Pioneer PL-70L II tonearm + Sony XL-44
Fidelity Research FR-64fx + Phasemation P-3G

Most of these combinations are considered 'vintage' and none of them are anywhere near the 'trophy' (or 'rip off') price category. But in my system on the same turntable they can easily compete with the one combination I use as 'reference' and which does sort of belong to that category: Reed 3P tonearm + vdHul Colibri XPW Blackwood (combined retail price around 10k).

It seems that the 'trophies' are in truth hidden in the search to find the right combinations. From a hobbyist perspective this is a great deal more fun that dropping 10 big ones in the blind and hoping to find audiophile redemption. But of course no individual can try out every possible combination. This is what crowd based platforms are made for, so let's put those 'big data' to some good use.

@daveyf 
Would such a list of tonearm / cartridge combinations put an end to your nightmare?

I found that tonearms make a difference. however, if you're not going to sit in the sweet spot, with the right room and speakers placed where they should be placed, you might be wasting your money. I can hear an improvement with a better arm but you have to be listening fot it. Also, paying attention to 'synergy' between arm and cartridge is a factor, I don't think it makes that big of difference if you stay in the middle of the road with each

When it comes to economics, audiophiles are the dumbest of people, they don't have a clue as to what the price of corn and gasoline have to do with cartridges and everything else; It's called INFLATION.

@edgewear   What you propose makes some sense. It would be an interesting data point for the cartridge and/or arm buyer to relate to. However, it is not solving the issue, and may in fact contribute to more problems...why...because you are assuming that the synergy that you are reporting on, is what the prospective arm and/or cartridge buyer is listening for. That is a matter of taste, and how do we determine if something meets our taste test; if we don't have an opportunity to hear it for ourselves. As was posted on my cartridge nightmare thread, in the old days, we had HP who generally called it as he heard it, and IF you agreed with his thinking on SQ ( which BTW, I did), you had a pretty good idea as to what you were getting. Not ideal by any means, but at least a fairly decent reference point, IMO. Today, unfortunately, we do NOT have such a reviewer of analog...and I do happen to think that MF's reporting is questionable at best....remember he has NEVER heard a piece of gear that he didn't like, so long as the price was high and ever spiraling! 

@orpheus10 Uhmmm...Last time I looked inflation wasn’t on the order of tens of percentage points in a period of just a very few years ( i don't know what country you live in, but certainly not here in the US)...as some of the cartridges in question have risen to.
As an example, the Lyra Etna was priced at $6K when newly released, now it is $8.9K...is that just due to inflation...please do tell!

 Davey, now that you have admitted that you generally agreed with the review opinions of HP, I think I understand you a bit better. While HP was probably the greatest of audio Review writers, his opinions were diametrically opposed to my own  in most cases where I was able to audition equipment he espoused. He seemed to prefer the shrill and the clinical over the musical. And he definitely tended to prefer the very expensive over the less expensive. So I am a bit surprised that you followed him so closely on that score alone. For one example, he may have been largely responsible for the popularity of the original Supex cartridges, which were the first moving coil cartridges to be widely marketed in the USA. To put it frankly, they were just awful.

@lewm where on earth do you get the idea that HP "seemed to prefer the shrill and clinical over the musical"?? HP was IMO one of the few audio writers who called it as he heard it....if he heard it as ’shrill and clinical’ that’s what he wrote, OTOH if he heard it as overly warm and ’musical’ that’s what he stated. HP was one of the first writers to state how great the Benz LPS MR was at the time, flying in the face of many who felt all Benz’ were too warm ( although not to me). Are you telling me that that cartridge is shrill and clinical??

@daveyf 
Of course you're right and it's not just the subjective priorities of the listener (aka as 'taste'). We also have to account for the synergy (or not) with the turntable and the rest of the system. Not to mention the system / room interface. No, I'm not suggesting there's an easy way out of your nightmare......

But at least we would no longer have to put up with the bias of reviewers, who are part of the system we want to change. Obviously we would have to accept ownership bias from the people reporting on their experiences. But the more input from different people you gather on the same tonearm/cartridge combinations, the more dependable the outcome might become. A Wikipedia of sorts....

It won't solve everything of course. Think about the Denon DL-103, generally acknowledged as a 'classic'. All those fans can't be wrong, right? So out of curiosity I bought one (a $250 cartridge will allow this) and tried it in all my tonearms as well as a variety of headshells (hadn't mentioned those yet). Whatever I tried, it sounded horrible in every combination. Sometimes you can polish all you want, but a turd is still a turd.....

Dave, whether you know it or not, the price of gold is inversely proportioned to the value of the dollar; as the price of gold goes up, the value of the dollar goes down.

Since the Lyra Etna is manufactured in Japan, there are a number of factors that must be taken into consideration; one of which is the Yen, Dollar exchange.


    https://goldprice.org/gold-price-history.html


   

Edgewear, I'm glad you confirmed what I suspected; you can polish a turd from now on, but when you get through, it's still going to be a turd.

 @orpheus10 

Right now the Yen dollar exchange is pretty favorable to the dollar...what does that have to do with any of my points about acquiring the cartridges in Japan, except for re-enforcing  them that is! 
Do you actually have any clue as to what these cartridges sell for in Japan...if not I would suggest you do a little research before coming back here.

"Or is it that most owners of record players online are dumpster-diving for vintage gear and simply can’t afford to listen to better?"



Madavid, you hit the nail on the head; the identical same goes for the cartridges; since they can’t pay for the ripe grapes, they pretend the green grapes are ripe.

The market is what it is; if you want a trip to musical paradise, you got to pay the price.


A studious audiophile has paid part of the price with the knowledge he's obtained over the years that enables him to get the most for his money, but at the end of the day, high end sound ain't cheap.

cdavids449, " I can hear an improvement with a better arm but you have to be listening fot it" 

Not IME. I used a rega rb300 for about 12 years & replaced that with a vintage Victor ua7045. Paid less for the Victor (12 years later) than the rega & it absolutely wiped the floor with it regardless of the cartridge that was mounted on it. I still have that arm & consider it on-par with the other arm I have set up, a Polestar. The Polestar is a little sweeter and extracts some more detail. The Victor sets a very nice stage. 

Boxer12...I agree! I meant to imply if you put on an album and use it as background music while you're doing chores, cooking, etc. I was skeptical about spending money on an arm because the rega has decent reviews. I have swapped amps, preamps, cables, etc..and have noticed slight improvements or maybe just a lateral move that sounds different. But moving from the rega to the helius it was a large difference with everything being better in every category! 

+1 cdavids449

Boys, I travel to Tokyo frequently and when there I haunt audio salons in my spare time. You will never see a Lyra cartridge overtly for sale in Tokyo. Likewise for Koetsu, maybe excepting their lowest cost models. If you ask a salesperson about Koetsu or Lyra, they don’t know what you’re talking about. Likewise also for Clearaudio and several others aimed at the foreign market, i.e., outside japan. Other good  brands can be found but there’s little price advantage especially considering the lack of a US warranty, like Audio Technica. That still leaves a few relative bargains, e.g., Shelter and Ikeda and a few brands we don’t see here in the US.

@lewm   The next time you are in Japan, give these guys a visit, and then get back to us:  http://analog.ev.shopserve.jp

That’s mail order.

The joke's on me.  I posted on the wrong thread, in my comment on buying cartridges in Japan.  Davey, however, found me. This tonearm thread is just as annoying.

@daveyf

The next time you are in Japan, give these guys a visit, and then get back to us: http://analog.ev.shopserve.jp

I’ve mentioned them earlier in this thread, the SoundHeights (link above) can ship overseas on request and reply on email request in english, but it is an exception. Normally japanese online shops do not ship internationally and don’t even speak english even if you visit them in Tokyo. About 5 years ago I’ve bought my SPU Spirit (limited edition) from them and they are good. When i’ve noticed miss tracking and became suspicious i have returned that new cartridge for full refund. Only 500 cartridges were made in this SPU Spirit series and mine was number 500 (the last one)! However, they are clearly explained me there is no warranty for buyers outside of japan. I would prefer to fix that cartridge under warranty, but it was impossible!

How does one know which tonearm goes with which table?

This looks like a good combination: Kuzma reference and Wheaton Triplaner; plus koetsu cartridge.


    https://www.tnt-audio.com/sorgenti/kuzma_stabi_e.html


    https://www.triplanar.com/


    https://www.stereophile.com/tonearms/the_tri-planar_tonearm/index.html


    https://www.upscaleaudio.com/collections/koetsu


Or maybe Lyra?



    https://www.signals.uk.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/Lyra-price-list-1.pdf


    http://lyraanalog.com/



Can anyone give any recommendations on this most exclusive shopping list?

edgewear - I've heard modified Denon 103s sound superb when properly loaded and on a matching tonearm.  It isn't a turd in my friends system.  Perla Audio has an engineer who does a fantastic job modifying the cartridge for a low price.  I've heard it and my friend purchased one (about $500).  What a bargain!

@madavid0when you wrote:

"The isn’t whether I want to spend a lot of money on high end tonearms or not, the issue is if they are a ripoff or not. Do they offer audio performance above cheaper ones? This is NOT hard to understand.

So far there is ONE poster who says he’s seen an improvement moving up from cheaper tonearms to more expensive ones. The others have all refused to address the question or admit that they think high end tonearms are a ripoff."

Can I just ask you the question - are all your opinions based upon making a jibe at what can be paraphrased as what you clearly think "more money than sense" audiophiles - or are you genuinely looking for guidance with a view to putting an arm on your TT.

You are asking questions on value - but that is utterly arbitrary. To person starving even £20 quid on a MM cartridge would be an extravagance. A Casio digital watch is as functional and accurate as a Patek Phillipe - likewise do you want food or a protein meal replacement shake. In other words what are your parameters? A Vertere or an SAT will be wasted on a Rega P2 lets' say. Put it on a OneDof or an AF1 and it makes sense. You don't put used Lada tyres on an F1 car - to some palpable and marginal gains may well be small - but to them it is value. 

In fact with all your posts I am curious as to what you have as your hifi system? Without wishing to insult those who own these products (I have owned them myself) but are you trying to compare a Rega P2 with an Exact Cartridge to an AF1 with a Lyra Atlas? 

You spend ages on the forums - as such do you actually listen to music, let alone your own music system?

definitely a Troll thread.  

OP doesn't understand law of diminishing returns, low volume artisanal products, or much else about the top end of analogue products.   

No one wants to answer the question. Most serious responses boil down to "expensive tonearms are a scam". For example @lohanimal post above in which he likens it to the difference between a Casio and Patek; the Patek keeps time no better than a Casio so therefore it’s a scam.

The others just simply dodge the question by repeating meaningless truisms about matching arms to the system. If, say, a FIdelity Research is a good match and so is a Triplanar U12 SE, would it be foolish to chose the Triplanar — because you’re paying a lot more for the same performance? If that’s so, isn’t the Triplanar just a scam in the final analysis? Some guy with a machine shop making huge margins on suckers?

A few responders DO say there is a performance improvement with higher end tonearms — but these are the clear minority in this thread.

I think there is a linear relationship between the cost of any tonearm and performance.  A $5500-tonearm will invariably outperform a $5000 tonearm.

I have decided not to entertaining the curiosity of the OP save to say this:

A bird has wings, so does a plane, therefore a plane is a bird...

Given the nature of this question and the attitudes expressed by the poster the answer for you sir is:  YES.  Now go away.

@billstevenson 

totally agree.
Let's live in a world of: Gruel; protein shakes; Ladas; grey brickwork and without hills and landscapes.
Because why bother??

What? 

I’ve had a Sumiko MMT (manufactured by Jelco: the current Jelco is basically the revered MMT) for 33 years. Sounds great, and like the Ever-ready Bunny, it’s been going and going. 

Older thread, but that TK-850L sure does look tasty to me (even better than a blue (is that a flavor?) Slurpee). Plus, as an unsuspecting consumer I love being ripped off. Just have to see if it will fit my Denon DK100 plinth.

You won't be ripped off with the 850L. GEM Dandy have the best price. 

The Audiomods arms were never "Rega-based", unless you consider using that company's good 1-piece tube makes an arm Rega-based. Every other part of the arm is non-Rega, and in the new Audiomods model even the tube is made by designer/machinist/owner Jeff, out of carbon fiber.