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Pani ... New ART-9 up and running ...

The Cartridge arrived and I took it down to Studio City to Acoustic Image to have Eliot Midwood set it up properly. Eliot is the bomb when it comes to setting up the Well Tempered turn tables correctly.

http://www.acousticimage.com/

So, last night I had Mr. Golden Ears over to get his assessment as well. For a brand new cartridge that had zero hours on it ... all I can say is WOW! This is one naturally musical cartridge that doesn't break the bank. Its everything I liked about the OC9-mk III, but it goes far beyond the OC-9 in every respect.

In a previous post, I talked about the many mono records I own and how good the OC-9 was with the monos. Well, the ART-9 is on steroids. Just amazing on mono recordings.

At under $1100.00 from LP Tunes, its a bargain. The ART-9 surpasses all cartridges I've had in the system before. That would include Dynavectors, Benz, Grado Signatures and a Lyra Clavis that I dearly loved. In fact, its more musically correct than the Clavis. The Clavis was the champ at reproducing the piano correctly ... the ART-9 is equally as good in this area.

Sound stage, depth of image, left to right all there. Highs ... crystalline. Mids ... female and male voices are dead on. Transparency ... see through. Dynamics ... Wow! Low noise floor ... black. Mono records ... who needs stereo?

Your assessment that the ART-9 doesn't draw attention to itself is dead on. You just don't think about the cartridge at all. Not what its doing, or what its not doing ... its just beautiful music filling the room.

Thanks again Pani for the recommendation. I'll keep posting here as the cartridge continues to break in.
128x128oregonpapa
sebrof's avatar
sebrof
837 posts
 
All I can say is you guys better be right about the ART-9. Based completely on your raves in this thread I ordered one, shipped today from LP Gear. Of course I never have bought anything because of some dudes on the internet, but hey what the heck.

I have an Ortofon Rondo MC cart and was looking at MC carts in the $2,000 range to replace it (this was $929). If the Art-9 works out I'll owe y'all a beer ;)
pani
1,219 posts
 
sebrof, just for your info I had the Rondo Red for some time too. Recently I compared the ART-9 to the Cadenza Blue, I would say the only area where the Blue and ART-9 were close was their relative neutrality to tone and timbre. In all other areas the Blue was a step below the ART-9. 
oregonpapa's avatar
oregonpapa OP
4,867 posts
 
sebrof ,,,

Step up to the bar. I'll take a Newcastle on tap.  :-)
sebrof's avatar
sebrof
837 posts
 
Pani good to hear about the Cadenda Blue because it would have been exactly that cartridge or the Dyna XX2 for me.

papa - Newcastle works for me.

I'll give my impressions after I receive it and let it settle in.
jollytinker
213 posts
 
I've thrown my hat into the ring too. Just purchased an ART9 from eBay.  about 12 hours on it so far and it's impressive, even out of the box. I'd call it an honest and precise sound, with admirable clarity and separation between instruments, and no particular weighting towards any one part of the spectrum. I don't hear an edginess in the top end, but just a compressed, over-damped quality that I assume will open up once the cart has more hours on it.  I'll check back in later with more details.  (I'm also breaking in new tonearm wire at the same time so that's contributing to the compressed sound).  

A couple of things so far: 
2Juki is amazing. I ordered the cartridge from him on Wednesday at the lowest available price on eBay. By Saturday afternoon I had it installed in my system (I'm in Boston, he's in Hong Kong).  Very happy with the service. 

about installing: the screws aren't as weird as they seem.  Yes you install them from the bottom up, but there's a trick. The supplied nuts have little slots in them on one side.  Make sure you put the slots facing up when you install the cart.  Once you have the nuts threaded on the screws, place the head of the supplied screwdriver in one slot and torque it just as you would a regular screw. It turns easily, and probably has less torque than a normal screw so it's a nifty design.  I had no trouble installing and adjusting this way.  

I'm hoping this cart will be better than my XX2 and my retipped Denon 103r, but not as good as my crazy expensive Zyx….


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