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Pani ... New ART-9 up and running ...

The Cartridge arrived and I took it down to Studio City to Acoustic Image to have Eliot Midwood set it up properly. Eliot is the bomb when it comes to setting up the Well Tempered turn tables correctly.

http://www.acousticimage.com/

So, last night I had Mr. Golden Ears over to get his assessment as well. For a brand new cartridge that had zero hours on it ... all I can say is WOW! This is one naturally musical cartridge that doesn't break the bank. Its everything I liked about the OC9-mk III, but it goes far beyond the OC-9 in every respect.

In a previous post, I talked about the many mono records I own and how good the OC-9 was with the monos. Well, the ART-9 is on steroids. Just amazing on mono recordings.

At under $1100.00 from LP Tunes, its a bargain. The ART-9 surpasses all cartridges I've had in the system before. That would include Dynavectors, Benz, Grado Signatures and a Lyra Clavis that I dearly loved. In fact, its more musically correct than the Clavis. The Clavis was the champ at reproducing the piano correctly ... the ART-9 is equally as good in this area.

Sound stage, depth of image, left to right all there. Highs ... crystalline. Mids ... female and male voices are dead on. Transparency ... see through. Dynamics ... Wow! Low noise floor ... black. Mono records ... who needs stereo?

Your assessment that the ART-9 doesn't draw attention to itself is dead on. You just don't think about the cartridge at all. Not what its doing, or what its not doing ... its just beautiful music filling the room.

Thanks again Pani for the recommendation. I'll keep posting here as the cartridge continues to break in.
128x128oregonpapa
audiolabyrinth's avatar
audiolabyrinth
4,555 posts
 
What's the best sounding turntable preamp for this cartridge?, I have a vintage technics 1600mk2 turntable,  after a year of research,  this cart is my pick, alot of people has recommended ear top flagship moving coil preamifcation. 
chakster's avatar
chakster
6,144 posts
 
@rantzmar

Chakster....Some guys who can hear simply write down what they hear and experience at the moment and revisit the notes later in the appropriate listening session. But the key...You have to be able to hear.

That makes sense if you are Michael Fremer and working on review, but analog or even digital recordings would be a better "documents" than just notes, so you can actually listen to those documented recordings to compare the quality of the raw new cartridge and fully burned-in cartridge. Personally i would never do that.

It is such a boring waste of time when you have to listen to some new cartridge that sounds awful when it’s new and doesn’t impressed you at all in the first 30 hrs. Especially if you have a better cartridge. I think this is exactly what happes, reported by @avanti1960 ?

Another question is why do you think the ART-9 is the cartridge for everyone? What’s the hype about it? And why it should be an MC cartridge? Audio-Technica made so many killer cartridges in the past, their MM cartridges from the 80s are spectacular (AT-ML170 OCC and AT-ML180 OCC) and goes nose-to-nose with Technics 100c mk4 for example. Those cartridges will cream most of the todays MC cartridges of any price.




chakster's avatar
chakster
6,144 posts
 
@pani

My friends have it on Jelco 9" and the big Thomas Schick tonearms.

Starange choice of the arms for this cartridge, even lower compliance ART2000 doesn’t sounds right on my Schick tonearm, but the ART9 has higher compliance (18 @ 100 Hz) than ART2000 (9 @ 100 Hz). Thomas Schick tonearm designed for cartridges with compliance below 22cu @ 10Hz maximum! Actually Shich works better with very low compliance cartridges. But the ART9 compliance converted from 100Hz to 10Hz would be as much as 30cu (which is high). 
jollytinker
213 posts
 
@chakster you're building your argument on straw men.  
It is such a boring waste of time when you have to listen to some new cartridge that sounds awful when it’s new and doesn’t impressed you at all in the first 30 hrs.

no one said that. Most say it starts out great and then gets better. That's what I experienced. You yourself wrote that break in makes sense. I agree with you.  It's like a new guitar or a violin. It needs to be played a while before it hits its real potential. You stick with it because you can hear from the beginning that it's a good instrument, so it's worth the effort. Nothing strange about that.  

That said, I agree that this thread could/should be more than just cheerleading for the ART9.  There's no professional review of this cart available (as imperfect as they often are) so it would be nice IMHO to have some attempts at objective description and comparisons with other carts.  I will attempt to contribute to that myself when my ART9 and Doshi phono stage are... em... broken in.  
chakster's avatar
chakster
6,144 posts
 
@oregonpapa

New: Pinched sound stage, aggressive highs, bloated bass, recessed mid-range and non-involving emotionally.

Broken in: Sound stage wide open with amazing 3-D imaging, soaring highs, tunefully correct bass lines, super present mid-range and great music like Bach’s "Air on a G string" just makes you want to cry.

This applies to most electronics, cables, fuses, new turntable belts (yes, turntable belts) in need of a break-in period, including cartridges. This, you can measure with your ears.

According to this logic and your description all new cartridges we are buyin’ sounds very bad and we have to live with this bad souding gear for a long time (just to burn-in those gear for up to 500hrs sometimes) as you said in another post. That means even if we play records for 2hrs per day we have to wait more than 8 month to finally get the sounds right. This is rediculous! Then people sells their cartridges for example (and lose money), often with just 200hrs on it, because they are not happy about the sound or always looking for something better.

IMO It’s better to buy used cartridges and used equimpent and enjoy them in full effect from the first listening session.

BTW thanks to the new manufacturers like Zu Audio who sells their speakers with factory burned-in drivers.
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