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What is the “World’s Best Cartridge”?

I believe that a cartridge and a speaker, by far, contribute the most to SQ.

The two transducers in a system.

I bit the bulllet and bought a Lyra Atlas SL for $13K for my Woodsong Garrard 301 with Triplanar SE arm. I use a full function Atma-Sphere MP-1 preamp. My $60K front end. It is certainly, by far, the best I have owned. I read so many comments exclaiming that Lyra as among the best. I had to wait 6 months to get it. But the improvement over my excellent $3K Mayijima Shilabi was spectacular-putting it mildly.

I recently heard a demo of much more pricy system using a $25K cartridge. Seemed to be the most expensive cartridge made. Don’t recall the name.

For sure, the amount of detail was something I never heard. To hear a timpani sound like the real thing was incredible. And so much more! 
This got me thinking of what could be possible with a different kind of cartridge than a moving coil. That is, a moving iron.

I have heard so much about the late Decca London Reference. A MI and a very different take from a MC. Could it be better? The World’s Best? No longer made.

However Grado has been making MI cartridges for decades. Even though they hold the patent for the MC. Recently, Grado came out with their assault on “The World’s Best”. At least their best effort. At $12K the Epoch 3. I bought one and have been using it now for about two weeks replacing my Lyra. There is no question that the Atlas SL is a fabulous cartridge. But the Epoch is even better. Overall, it’s SQ is the closest to real I have heard. To begin, putting the stylus down on the run in grove there is dead silence. As well as the groves between cuts. This silence is indicative of the purity of the music content. Everything I have read about it is true. IME, the comment of one reviewer, “The World’s Best”, may be true.
 

 

mglik
lewm
13,027 posts
 

Ralph, thanks. Your corroborating my preliminary hypothesis will save time. Getting the very heavy chassis safely down to my basement workshop is my next problem. I’m hoping that the output tube in question was not damaged. Visual inspection shows that none of the 3 cathode wires is blown. That’s encouraging. There’s a problem in the bias circuit for that one position that’s going to be hard to find, because evidently I did not find it 6 months ago when the exact same problem occurred.

Mijo, as I think you know, my amplifiers are essentially older MA2s with huge EI type power transformers that make them very heavy. I think you’ll be getting toroidal power transformers on your new MA2s. Much lighter.

atmasphere's avatar
atmasphere
11,794 posts
 

Mijo, as I think you know, my amplifiers are essentially older MA2s with huge EI type power transformers that make them very heavy. I think you’ll be getting toroidal power transformers on your new MA2s. Much lighter.

@lewm To be clear this is the M-240, of which exactly 6 chassis sets were made. It used a lot of MA-2 parts. You built yours up in bits didn't you?

blueranger's avatar
blueranger
719 posts
 

Going to be a little sarcastic. The best phono cartridge in the world is the one you heard years ago in an audio shop when your hearing was still sensitive. It was the first really good one you heard and it left an indelible impression on you. 

dogberry
649 posts
 

It was the first really good one you heard and it left an indelible impression on you. 

I daresay there is something in what you say - first love and all that. The eye-opening (ear-opening?) experience that reveals previously unknown possibilities. Mine came with my father-in-laws LP12 (cartridge - I never knew enough to enquire at the time - it was about the music and not the equipment!), Quad amp and B&W active speakers. I later learned that wasn't quite perfection...

So, I have continued to enjoy such revelations with appropriate investments (and yes, there were too many investments made on the basis of reviews that disappointed). I am convinced there are more such leaps of experience to be made, but now being retired I don't think I shall ever make them given the price of admission.

Oh, that other kind of first love? She's still here. The one that stops me playing jazz, blues, Supertramp, Steely Dan and The Doobie Brothers when she's around. But she did support me discovering opera in my thirties and travelling across the country three times a year for my fix at the COC. The one that was in tears this morning on hearing a choral version of The Lark Ascending. She's a keeper.

pindac's avatar
pindac
2,864 posts
 

The Lark Ascending - A Musical Encounter like few others, it is Transcendental in how it can touch a person.

It does me proud when listened to on the TV, let alone the HiFi System.

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