Has anyone tried these? Thoughts?

These Cart's have a growing support.

I have heard a Grandmaster, it was used for about 30 minutes in a demonstration, but I can't recollect wanting to aspire to using it.

There are new energizers becoming available from other producers and some of these are getting a very good appraisal, and are Superseding the use of the DS Audio Design.

Not many who know/own these Cart's are familiar with them in use with a Bespoke Produced Energizer, so the assessments and reports are not too common at present.

The owner of the Grandmaster that I have witnessed in use, now has a selection of the Cart's at differing purchase values, and they also have a Third Party Energizer I made them aware off.

A EE Friend has an interest in these as well, claims, using the supplied DS Audio Schematic with a few tweaks to the Topology and Circuit Design. A Energizer of very high quality build components, can be produced for under £200. 

Combine the £200 Energizer Cost with a £700 Base Model Cart' and it does look like certain individuals with the EE Skills can get into using this Cart' Type quite affordably.

I have also seen that there are Third Party Cart' Services now working with the DS Audio Cart's as well, I am not sure if a Boron Armature and FGS Styli has been a treatment, but it might not be too far away.       

While the technology is intriguing, I prefer “velocity” based pickups as opposed to “displacement” types out of respect for proper decoding of record equalization, typically RIAA.

Dear @boothroyd : I agree with you against the Strain-Gauge displacement design but in the displacement DS Audio/optical design exist an eq. that’s more simple ( meaning lower signal manipulation ) than the traditional RIAA eq.

R.