Graham Phantom vs the Graham 2.2

Doug: **** " From a practical standpoint, anyone considering a Mk VII really doesn't care about any possible weaknesses of the Mk II or Mk IV. All that matters is what arm s/he's going to get today. " ****

I totally agree with you.

Regards and enjoy the music.

Raul.

Dear friends: This is another example of the " black magic " between the tonearm/cartridge combo:

in the past, I buy two tonearms MDC-800 from Sumiko ( The Arm ) that I never mounted. A few months ago I put on sale one of them ( I think for 800.00 dls here in Audiogon ) and in the first ad day I have 15 persons heavy intersted on buying this tonearm ( inclusive, I receive a 1,100.00 offer for it. ), it sold that first day ( unfortunatelly for me ). My idea was two put on sale both but after the people reaction I ask me why everyone wants this tonearm, so I mount for the first time in my system.
I try with the Denon DS-1 and with the Sumiko Celebration ( I can't mate with heavy weight cartridges because I have only the low weight counterweigt on the tonearm ) and both cartridges sound exellent. At that time my Colibri ( the 2.5gr version ) was on the Breuer 8 and sounding really good. I take the Colibri from the Breuer and mate with the MDC-800 and now the sound not only is a very good one but an exeptional one ( My Colibri and my MDC-800 born to be together for ever. ).

The MDC-800 is an exellent tonearm copy from the Breuer in any single parameter but the internal wires, and it hands down the Breuer ( at least with my Colibri ), the Breuer is one of the best tonearms ( for many people is the best ) ever made. BTW, I already sold the Breuer and take this money to buy another tonearm and cartridge.

Regards and enjoy the music.

Raul.

Raul,

You are living the dream (that's a good thing!) though I'm disappointed to learn you can "only" mount ten tonearms at one time. Surely you can do better than that. I'm not sure how you have time to eat or sleep.

Fascinating story about the Lustre GST-801, which I confess I've never heard of. I agree you can't really predict how an arm and cartridge will play by their measurements, even if you know the measurements. There is more involved in music and music reproduction than engineers know how to measure.

Cello's Graham/Schroeder/TriPlanar comparison, all in the same system with the same cartridge, will also be very interesting.

Regardless of Raul's comments, I think the comparisons that we will do between the Graham 2.2, TriPlanar (latest iteration) and Schroder Reference while using a ZYX Universe which might be one of the most uncolored and detailed cartridges available today and on a fairly detailed, dynamic and quite revealing system, should be as good as it gets for doing comparisons between arms. Everything will be held constant except the tonearms. All of the tonearms will have already been broken in.
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We will share the results with the rest of you based on a consensus of the observations of several audiophiles with excellent ears. The hope is that the results will be helpful to Audiogoners who have those 3 arms on their short list to be able to make a decision of which direction they would like to go with regards to a tonearm purchase.
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Larry, am I experiencing a weird sense of deja vu, or did that last post of yours appear yesterday and then reappear today? I know I'm losing my mind, but this is spooky! :-)