Fidelity Research FR5e

One important problem I remember when I first listened to the FR-5E.....was the fact that the plastic ‘yoke’ which attaches the stylus holder to the aluminium cartridge body was loose and wobbled. 😱
This initially made the sound so warm, wooly and undefined that I’m happy I found the problem.
Using Superglue all along the joints, solved this problem.....👌

This cartridge is so cheap so i bought many of them and in my experience the low inductance FR-5E is better than FR-6SE.

The versions of the FR-5 are Conical (5), Elliptical (5E) and also 5SE which i have never tried.

The weight of the cartridge itself is very low, i’ve had the best result with ZYX LIVE-18 headshell.

But this cartridge is nothing special compared to the Grace F-9F,AT-ML150, Garrott P77, Stanton 881s and the higher models of those Grace, AT, Stanton are on another level. If i remember correct even the Ortofon M20FL was superior to the FR-5E and FR-6e, but they are impossible to find for such a low price as the FR MM cartridges.

Later i have discovered the sound of Ikeda-San’s MC cartridges and they are indeed very special in my opinion, much better than his MM design. The champs are FR-7f and Fidelity-Research PMC-3

The best thing about FR-5E is the price, which is often under $60 if you know where to find them. It’s hard to imagine anyone can find some other MM cartridge at this price. I think you’re already have much better cartridges, so i don’t think you will be impressed much.

Thanks everyone for your responses, very informative.

I'll give it an audition and if doesn't impress I'll use it on my son's table. 

What happened??