Recommendation on MC cartidge and Phono Preamp

For the kind of money you are budgeting, I would consider a moving magnet cartridge, although there are some MC cartridges available for under $1000 that are quite nice. You can see though that this does not leave you with much of a budget for a preamp if you spent $1K on a cartridge!

The Denon 103r or variants are relatively affordable and actually have stellar performance. That would allow you to spend about $2500 or slightly more on a preamp.

*** manufacturer disclaimer warning: ***
FWIW we just introduced a LOMC capable preamp in this price range.

Ralph, I gave him the same advice on his other thread.

To the OP, Atmasphere designs and builds phono stages (and other amplifiers) for a living. He's also a recording and LP production engineer. He knows whereof he speaks.

Which model is it? Is it a good match for my Mac ma6600?

Parasound

I second Parasound JC3 and Dynavector 20x2L