Koetsu Blue Lace Onyx vs. Coralstone

@mulveling

I have the LL1931Ag. I consulted the factory and they referred me to K&K, and after discussion, I took their recommendation. Very pleased.

Haven’t noticed any diminution of mid bass punch or impact. Some loss of sweetness, yes, I think so - but I recovered that, and more, by precisely torquing and aligning the cartridge. I concluded that the 31Ag was simply faithfully rendering the signal it was given.

Since you already have LL1931’s, you know that they don’t need anything but loading resistors and a box. That makes DIY SUT’s feasible for almost anyone, and makes the 1931Ag’s highly cost-effective. Speaking of loading resistors, I strongly recommend nude Vishay. To my ears, there is not even a competitor.

Good luck!

Thanks @terry9
My phono stage is a VAC Renaissance SE with the LL1931 built-in, and is chock-full of nude Vishays (I counted 36), including the loading slots. I’d previously borrowed a non-SE; the SE model’s Jupiter beeswax caps and nude Vishays make quite a positive difference. I figure I might as well go all-out to the Ag SUT at this point; agreed that the K&K prices are extremely reasonable! What loading value did you settle on for your Koetsu?

Loading is record dependent, to me. I like values between 30 and 500 ohms, but having said that, I'm probably going to change my tune when I finish my phono/pre V2.0 (which allows values 10 to 1500).

@mulveling 

Forgot to reference you. My phono should be finished in a few weeks (said that months ago!), should be able to give you a tighter range at that point.

After waiting for 4 months I'm now a very happy owner of a Blue Lace Diamond Cantilever cartridge. Although just 40ish hours old & not near fully broken in, the Blue Lace is way better (& unfortunately more expensive) than any cartridge I owned previously, it simply blown the Ortofon A95 that it replaced away cleanly. The soundstage is huge and rock solid, speed and dynamic range both staggering. I was surprised how different it sounds compared to the wood-bodied Koetsu I had before, the Blue Lace is simply a very modern high end pick up, no excuse needed to be made for this little gem. But it was a bitch to mount given its short (& almost transparent) cantilever at the middle of the underbelly.  The local dealer informed me that basically all stone-bodied Koetsu have same construction, except for different body material obviously, but they do sound slightly different for some reason, Blue Lace being most lean and neutral, followed by Coralstone. For those who prefer a slight warmer presentation should go for Tiger Eye.