Dear @jcarr and others, do any of you have information about the Takai Laboratory Final MC cartridge? Yesterday Hifishark had a Yahoo auction listed of this intriguing beast.
The integrated headshell body looks like a Sony XL-44, but is painted in blue/grey with a copper top plate. The big surprise is that it sports Sony’s unique one piece diamond/stylus assembly. I’m not sure, but judging from the pictures it seems to have a long joint pipe and fairly short cantilever as described by @jcarr, so apparently identical to the standard XL-88D. Could this be considered a worthy alternative to the Sony?
BTW, I recently acquired an AT1000MC. The diamond cantilever has an oblique cut, but the stylus is inserted in a way similar to the Dynavector diamond cantilever assemblies. So not of one piece like the Sony. It does sound terrific though.....
The integrated headshell body looks like a Sony XL-44, but is painted in blue/grey with a copper top plate. The big surprise is that it sports Sony’s unique one piece diamond/stylus assembly. I’m not sure, but judging from the pictures it seems to have a long joint pipe and fairly short cantilever as described by @jcarr, so apparently identical to the standard XL-88D. Could this be considered a worthy alternative to the Sony?
BTW, I recently acquired an AT1000MC. The diamond cantilever has an oblique cut, but the stylus is inserted in a way similar to the Dynavector diamond cantilever assemblies. So not of one piece like the Sony. It does sound terrific though.....