Hear my Cartridges....🎶

Thanks Dover for your brilliant commentary....👍

At this point I am done with comparisons - could you please just send me the Sony for Xmas.

Hahaha 🤣
And no......it’s not your imagination! The Sony is a wonderment...
Don’t forget....after dozens of ’shoot-outs’ and comparisons with nearly 30 cartridges, the Palladian and DLR have both risen to the top (in our collective opinions)...and sometimes by just very subtle and incremental degrees.
In other words...they are the ’Creme de la Creme’...🤗
To then have the XL-88D come along and literally ’blow’ them out of the water is unfathomable 🤯
I have never before, heard a cartridge display such obvious overwhelming superiority...And it’s scary 😳
As I stated in my ’Diamond Cantilever Thread’....how can I now listen to anything else?!
But at the same time.....how can I play it AT ALL......knowing with every revolution of the platter that I am slowly ’killing it’ 🥴
Perhaps I should ’digitise’ all my favourite recordings with the Sony to preserve its sound for posterity?
"Perfect Sound Forever" 🎼💿🎶

@halcro,
Digitizing would be very silly of course, but you now have the perfect excuse to buy the best open reel tape machine you can afford to preserve the Sony sound in all analog.......

Hmmm....interesting idea Edgewear 🤔
Thanks...
Any recommendations?

No, not really. I only have a humble Nakamichi 700 II cassette recorder. I bought it for nostalgic reasons mostly and while it sounds very nice, it's no match for vinyl playback. For that you probably need to look at 2 track open reel at 38 cm/sec. I've been looking at this from a distance, 'cause this is where my wife draws the line. You have to pick your fights and this isn't one of them.

Anyway, the golden standard of course are professional master recorders like the Studer A-80, some of which have found their way to domestic surroundings. I believe one member here - mikelavigne - even has two, so he should be able to let you in on the intricacies of finding one is good condition. There was a time when these machines sporadically  appeared on the open market at reasonable prices, but those days have passed.

There's also the top models of domestic audio, like Revox A77, Technics RS-1700 or even Akai GX-747 (not sure if I have all the numbers correct), but again prices have gone up dramatically for well kept specimen. The reason is probably those darned reviewers who have been plugging open reel tape as the best analog source for some years now, fueling a whole new market of refurbished / redesigned tape machines and 'master tape copies' at very high prices. But with your Sony you could beat them at their game and create your own master tape copies.......

I tried, I really tried. I have made my feelings about the Decca known many times previously and I wanted to be sure that no bias crept into my assessment this time around.

In previous comparisons I always felt that the Decca was a superior cartridge to the Palladian in the areas that are priorities for me: tonal truthfulness (naturalness) and linearity. In those areas and compared to the Palladian the Decca wins handily once again.  Sound staging excellence takes a back seat for me no matter how impressive or fun it may be with another cartridge. Glad to know the Dover agrees with my ranking of the two.

Sony/Decca:
Awesome recording. Beautiful music. Much of the music was lifted and used in the Broadway musical “Kismet”. The melody heard here in the beginning was used as the melody for the song “Stranger In Paradise” from that musical.

Many of the sound staging characteristics that I heard in previous comparisons with the Decca are evident here. The Decca presents a more compact soundstage and a mid/rear of the hall perspective. Very well organized soundstage, but one feels as if sitting about half way toward the back of the hall. The Sony gives a more upfront perspective with larger individual images and a great sense of front to back with images. This is the first time that this quality has been so clear in one of these comparisons. The clarinet clearly and correctly sounds that it is sitting further back than the flute and piccolo. A very impressive sound stage. Likewise, one can hear that the French Horn is sitting further back still and there is a hint of the sound bouncing off the back wall. Great stuff. The Sony is amazing that way and I can only imagine what it sounds like in Halcro’s room.

There are a couple of areas where the Decca still wins for me, however. Again, these areas may not be priorities for some and we are comparing two fantastic cartridges. I would be hard pressed to call one cartridge superior to the other and certainly would not say that the Sony “blows the Decca out of the water”. Again, this according to my priorities.

Within the Decca’s smaller and less impressive sound stage there is slightly better linearity and with certain instruments just a slightly better sense of tonal truthfulness. All very subtle and, again, may not matter as much to some listeners and may not be evident with some music. Overall, the Sony sounds more fleshed out; perhaps a bit too much so at times. It does give a great sense of the inner texture of instrumental timbres. As does the Decca, but which does it in a more compact way due to the smaller individual images. For me, with the Sony there is a slight thickness in the lower mids/upper bass that is not present with the Decca. Listen to the sound of the bass drum. More powerful with the Sony, but one hears the sound of mallet hitting skin and the way that the drum was tuned a little more clearly with the Decca’s. For me the overall sound with the Sony is just a little corpulent at times compared to the sound with the Decca which is a bit leaner. Personally, I would feel the urge to turn down the volume on the subs one notch; or perhaps lower the xover point just a couple of hertz. Not so with the Decca. I love the sound of the triangle with the Decca. Leaner than with the Sony, but with a beautiful shimmer and long decay.

I agree with Dover that the Sony gives a great sense of the grandeur of the music and with his other comments in general. It is very impressive in that regard. Two fantastic cartridges and I would be hard pressed to choose one over the other.

Thanks, Halcro for another interesting comparison and tell Princi “nice haircut”.

https://youtu.be/HEOEZ-HOWkU