koetsu

I'd hazard to guess you had more than 2,000 hours in 13 years, but I'm thinking of myself.
I have limited cart experience; started with a benz gold (didn't enjoy it much), but with the great trade-in program they used(?) To have i soon went to a medium output woodbody benz. Loved it. Then when Lyra replaced the Helikon with the Kleos i jumped ship, and haven't missed much.
It seems to me that there's an entry "price for admission" as I've changed brands, and if that holds true in moving to Koetsu then itseems (to me) probable that without going to at least a Urushi it would only be a step sideways.
Bear in mind that the Kleos, when it first came out, was 2.5K. Now look at the price.
I'd like to state again how i appreciate the input. All of it. Ours can sometimes seem such a tiny, closed-off world.

I would definitely go for the Koetsu Black. It`s hugely dynamic, and a real bargain compared to the other Koetsus. I have owned one, and I still regret selling it. 
Moving further up the Koetsu line brings still more dynamics and better holography, but at a cost. 
I have owned Koetsus off and on for the last 30 years, and my current one is a Coralstone. An amazing cartridge, but the Black was more fun, IMO.

roberjerman
09-11-2017 9:36pm
I recommend a moving coil step up transformer (SUT) for use with any low-output (less than 1 millivolt) mc cartridge.

SUTs are a disaster for amplification of LOMC’s. Transformers have non linearities, particularly with regard to phase accuracy and are prone to ringing, it is not possible for a SUT based phono system to accurately reproduce what is on the record correctly.
Ringing muddies the sound and phase anomalies result is harmonics destroyed and sound stage distortions - the musical timing is lost.
Even the much vaunted Jensen transformers have to resort to zobel networks to try and tidy these issues up.
If you only listen to noise then by all means use a SUT, but it cannot produce music unless you consider music to be a series of distorted notes with no timing.

Yikes!