I’ve gone through too many tonearms to list, beginning with the old Garrard articulated arm, through Transcriptors, VPI, Unipivot and Graham. For a while, my vote went to the JMW Memorial 10.5-inch arm for its price, straightforward setup, ease of adjustment and use, but on my current turntable I went with an an Apparition 12-inch arm from Analog Instruments (New Zealand) and I'm not looking back.
First, assuming you’re doing the installation yourself, the geometry defined by the longer arm makes initial setup and adjustment much easier and slightly less critical. Second, the cocobolo wood arm tube does everything it’s supposed to do regarding vibration/resonance. Even with my midrange Shelter cartridge, the sound is pure and absolutely clean. Since my table was custom-designed and built, there is no plinth. Instead, a 70-pound solid brass pillar supports the tonearm; positioning is infinitely variable and, once set up, it’s virtually immoveable. The Apparition is a very simple pivot design that is not without caveats (the dimple in which the pivot sits is subject to wear and mis-placement), but what it lacks in sophistication it more than makes up for in ease of setup, use and quality.
In short, I'm a member of “the longer the better” club. I have no experience with air-bearing tangential arms but, given the choice (and with the room for placement), I would go with a 12- or even a 13-inch pivot arm over a 9- or 10-inch arm any day.
First, assuming you’re doing the installation yourself, the geometry defined by the longer arm makes initial setup and adjustment much easier and slightly less critical. Second, the cocobolo wood arm tube does everything it’s supposed to do regarding vibration/resonance. Even with my midrange Shelter cartridge, the sound is pure and absolutely clean. Since my table was custom-designed and built, there is no plinth. Instead, a 70-pound solid brass pillar supports the tonearm; positioning is infinitely variable and, once set up, it’s virtually immoveable. The Apparition is a very simple pivot design that is not without caveats (the dimple in which the pivot sits is subject to wear and mis-placement), but what it lacks in sophistication it more than makes up for in ease of setup, use and quality.
In short, I'm a member of “the longer the better” club. I have no experience with air-bearing tangential arms but, given the choice (and with the room for placement), I would go with a 12- or even a 13-inch pivot arm over a 9- or 10-inch arm any day.