The 'tube-transistor' enigma by MC carts?


By accident I got to know an guy from Swizerland who has
worked for years as technician (R&D,testing,manuf.etc) by
Benz. I made some joke about 'Zelle',the expresion he used
to refer to carts,by asking if the carts are made by
prisoners? ('zelle' is 'the box' in the prison) He appreciated my joke and explaned to me in 2 sentences
something I never thought about. There are 2 kinds of
'bobins': iron and the other kind. The 'classical example'
of 'iron' is the Ortofon SPU. The advantage: stronger signal and some kind of 'pleasing warm sound.the disadvantage:(more)distortion.
The 'ruby-cross' bobin has (much?) less distortion but can
sound 'thin' depending on the rest of 'the chain'.
This is obviously the so-called 'Holistic' approach ;
aka Rauls 'it depends...'. Me? Because I can't cope with
more then 2 variables at the same time I am for 'simplicity' approch. The best 'definition' of this
approch is from O.Wilde:'I have the simplest tastes. I am
alwys satisfid with the best'. So I am still seaching.
Raul will you please bring (more) light to this issue?


Cheers
128x128nandric
Atmashere. The 'bobin' is the 'thing' one must put the 'coils' on (copper wire,silver,gold,platinium).I am not an technical guy but I think that even your Orpheus,despite the Greek mytolology can't do without.

Cheers
If you look at allnicaudio.com in the products section under mc cartridge,they have an explanation of bobbin,coil etc.Naturally they say their shape (mimics the cutter head,non magnetic) is of course the best.At any rate you don't need to be a technical guy to understand this well laid out informative explanation.I have not heard their cartridge,but am thankful for their informative presentation.
Nandric, my understanding is that the bobbin in the Orpheus is round, like the bobbin in a voice coil of a speaker. It is not cross-shaped like the Micro Benz use.
Atmasphere.My conjecture was 'iron bobbin' =the analogy
with 'tube-amps' because of the distortions with 'pleasing
sound'.Those are 'harmonic distortions' but I am not sure
of which 'order'. The other kind of bobbins are more
'neutral sounding' because of 'lesser distortions'. Aka
the analogy with 'transistors amps'.Look at the mesurements
of distortions by both kind of amps.If I am well informed the peculiarity of Orpheus is not the 'bobbin'
but the magnets: two 'circular magnets';one in front the
other behind the bobbin.So my quess is that you confused
'bobbin'- with 'magnet kind'. But the issue is 'tube-versus
transistor' enigma by MC carts.My quess is that the persons with preference for 'neutral sound' will not choose 'iron bobbin' MC carts. I am informed by my Zwitserland connection that Benz also manuf. 'iron-bobbin' carts:the MC-2.BTW I made the distinction 'iron'
versus 'other kind of bobbins' (i.e. not iron).So if your
Orpheus is 'round','right angled' or 'cross-shaped' is not
relevant; it is included by the 'other kind'.
I understand the fixation for the object of 'our desire'
but the issue is about something else.

Cheers
Dear Nandric: I can't understand in a precise way what you mean by cartridge " iron bobins ".

Perhaps you are reffering to the cartridge armature where the coils goes on.

There are different type ( like you say ) bobins like cross-shaped, v-shaped, square-shaped, etc, etc.

Fron the point of view by some cartridge builders the non-magnetic/non-conductive cartridge armature build material is more linear, example: Ortofon in its top of the line MC cartridges use carbon-fiber material.

IMHO a cartridge quality performance depend on many design factors and the execution quality on the design, I think that there is no single/aisle cartridge design factor that could define the whole cartridge quality performance but the " wise " choice/synergy of all cartridge factors in the final design/build product.

+++++ " The advantage: stronger signal and some kind of 'pleasing warm sound.the disadvantage:(more)distortion. " +++++

if that is true that is a trade-off like almost always in any audio item design, which cartridge trade-offs design/build are the best?, well which quality cartridge performance do you like more.

Now, IMHO I think that other than a direct cartridge builder ( like Dynavector or Scan-Tech ) the right person in this analog forum to give us an in deep explanation on the subject is JCarr, I hope he can share its knowledge with all of us.

Regards and enjoy the music.
Raul.