ZEN cartridge ?

More or less accidentally I stumbled on this old thread about 'zen' cartridges and the resulting confusion as there are in fact two kinds: the Zenn brand designed by Hiroaki Hibino and identical to the Klipsch MCZ series (Z presumably for Zen?) and the Zen model released by Sato Musen. The name of the designer of this cartridge is unknown to me, but the construction has more than a passing resemblance to the direct couple design as seen in the Victor MC- L1000.

The Sato Musen is incredibly rare and hard to find, but even the Diamond (cantilever) version is less costly than the Victor, which has become something of a cult item. This started a few years ago, when Audio Technica released their 'revolutionary' AT-ART1000 Direct Power MC cartridge at $5k+, which is clearly based on Victor's Direct Couple design.
The Zenn (or Klipsch) comes around slightly more often - except the diamond cantilever version, which I've never seen - and are usually offered at very reasonable prices.

Both these 'zen(n)' cartridges dating from the 1980's (!) are absolutely wonderful performers, so anyone interested in 'vintage' MC cartridges should keep an eye out for these two. Both can be found on the right side of $1000 and they easily compete with most cartridges on the market today.

@best-groove, I agree with you that the Sato Musen Zen Diamond is an absolutely wonderful cartridge. To my ears sonically competitive with current top mc cartridges.

For the record it needs to be said that the diamond cantilever is NOT like the Sony XL-88D. This cartridge utilized a one piece diamond cantilever/stylus assembly, which to my knowledge is unique and exclusive to Sony.

The diamond cantilever of the Sato Musen looks very similar to the one used on Dynavector’s Karat Nova 13D. The way the stylus is attached to the cantilever seems to indicate they were both sourced from Namiki.

Funny how the Zenn cartridge keeps creeping into this discussion 😉

As for the Sato Musen Zen, my guess is that this was indeed built by Victor, similar or even identical to Kanno’s original design. While the body looks more like the MC-L10, the construction of the coils is as the L1000 (not etched) and the specs are also identical. I don’t know the facts on the Sato Musen brand, but most likely it was a small Japanese operation specialized in audio related products. Apparently they were in the position to request from Victor/Kanno-San a special version with a diamond cantilever, which was never available from Victor.

I have both the MC-L1000 and Sato Musen Zen Diamond and they share the same sonic profile. Both are capable of producing huge dynamic swings that make the soundstage balloon in all directions, seemingly without any limitations. The Zen with diamond cantilever is if anything even more explosive than MC-L1000 with aluminum cantilever. But it also sounds slightly warmer in the midrange, perhaps due to the different body material.

The only other cartridge I know that can manage this sort of dynamics is the original Ikeda 9. This cantileverless design also has the coils directly above the stylus. Reports from other users suggest that the Decca and the Neumann DST, also variations on this ’direct couple’ theme, have the same characteristics. Obviously no coincidence!

@chakster, thanks for pointing this out. The owner’s manual and specs are all in Japanese and I just assumed the cantilever would be aluminum. But upon closer inspection it looks to be a solid rod of a brighter metal. So you could be correct that the MC-L1000 is also beryllium.

@best-groove, I agree that both cartridges may have been OEM from another manufacturer (or an artisan one man operation, as the case might be). JVC Victor may have been a large corporation at the time, but it was not particularly known for phono cartridges.

I don’t have much information on the designer apart from his name, but Kanno San currently does the design work for Phasemation. Perhaps he had and still has his own workshop? Like Takeda San when he was OEM for Levinson, Cello, Krell, MoFi and 47Labs before setting up his own Miyabi brand. Or Matsudaira San as OEM for Air Tight, TechDas, Accuphase, etc. next to his own MSL brand.