SME 3009 Series III Haters

The only reason to assume that the III should be used with high compliance cartridges is its very low mass

@lewm7  au contraire - compliance matching is dictated by resonance.  Mass is just one factor of a resonance equation.  "Flexi" is another factor (actually several factors, but let's lump them together).  Think of it this way:  if you have a wooden pole 12 feet long that bends and flexes slightly (not necessarily the same in each axis), will adding more weight (not mass) at one or both ends make the pole flex less or more?

The correct answer is more.  Weight added at then fulcrum increases stability while weight added outside of the fulcrum decreases stability; increasingly so the further away from the fulcrum you add the weight.  If you add weight while adding stiffness, or increasing the mass (in this case, weight added proportionally to all the lever) then "flexi" or compliance will reduce.

Who says that science and audio don't have anything to do with each other?

I think they can only go up in value.
Investing in gear with a solid
name behind it is like money in the
bank. I’ve bought and sold enough
used Mcintosh gear to know that first
hand. Some expensive esoteric gear
might be better but good luck finding
the right guy wanting it 10 years down
the road if the company has gone belly up.
We all have to admit at a certain level we
are really just splitting hairs. If someone
has taken the time to put together a system that works well together you
hear it instantly. I sold some used gear recently and delivered it, every guys system was worth under $10k or so
but they all sounded amazing.  
What a hobby! 😎

SME III, the most elegant and beautiful tonearm in the world, and the finest and best looking design they ever did.
And the technically finest pivot arm ever created. The secret lies in damping, quite literally. Large kinda slightly loose yet very tightly coupled & azimuth adjustable headshell, very rigid & very light titanium-nitride arm wand, teak damped wand, fluid damping, ballast weights around pivot, and all those discontinuity points along the resonance path from headshell/wand to wand/bearing which intentionally is not the highest tolerances, it actually acts as damper. Brilliant design. Works just fine with lower compliance carts as well, simply add mass on headshell, 2 g or 4 g spacer provided.
After that SME went downhill.

SME III + SHURE Ultra 500 + ORACLE DELPHI MKII is a monstrous combination, the midrange especially is so ludicrously transparent that I still vividly remember that über detailed sound and in high register sweetness yet so powerful sound I experienced exactly thirty years ago. It was maestro Hendrix in Electric Ladyland and a cheap Dutch reissue but it opened a window to another, brighter world. The arriving UFO from distant space circling across the room to close my face was loud and BIG.
Moon, turns the tides gently gently away ..... And I never looked back.

And shortly after went in greater things, let my Hi-Fi specialist replace stock wires with very delicate silver, uninterrupted path from cart pins to RCA plugs and straight to preamp. It was 1991 and my Hi-Fi world was never the same. Revelation.

MuddyWaters, you surely, or shall I say shurely have a great taste : )
Enjoy your great cartridges and system.
And like you, I guess, I have always laughed at SME III haters.
 
 End of story.

There are several better looking arms out there but for the average audiophile spending thousands on an arm or even a
turntable is out of the question. I don’t think there is anything as good as this under $500.

This is exactly the price point for Denon DA-401, it is under $500
Wonderful tonearm, i became a fan of it quickly.

Something equal in this price category is Micro Seiki made for Luxman (answer to Infinity Black Widow).

P.S. Another favorite so far is Victor UA-7045 for slightly higher price (used). Actually many vintage tonearms are best buy in terms of quality versus price. Some of them just less popular or unknown compared to SME, most of them are Japanese, not British.