What do you think of your Soundsmith Cartridge

I love my Sound Smith Aida for 2 reasons: 1) it kicks a--, and 2) if/when I do something stupid and break it, he’ll rebuild it for $350. The only reason I’d "dump" my Sound Smith Aida is to buy a better / different Sound Smith cartridge. Not to mention, Peter is a good dude, too.

I own a Soundsmith Boheme. It is the smoothest most natural sounding cartridge I ever owned.

Even my lowly $400 Otello has more detail than any Grado, also an MI , I've heard under a grand . In Classical that is important .

I had a Boheme; loved it.  Traded it in for Soundsmith The Voice.  I'm sticking with Soundsmith.  I will say with a disclosure that I do not have "golden ears", The Voice may be slightly better to my ears, but man the Boheme was hard to beat.

I've owned a Zephyr and a Zephyr MIMC (and still do) and I like them but have never fallen in love with then. I have a VPI Prime and a Manley Steelhead. I would describe the sound as up-front and lively, but they don't do soundstage and depth and lack the refined and dare I say it, realistic reproduction I get from my two Benz Gliders SLO's (ironically both rebuilt by Soundsmith) or the ease and smoothness yet detail I love in my Ortofon Quintet Black. Irrespective of Peter L's vast knowledge and technical expertise, I just don't think that MI is a realistic competitor to MC. When things are right, you just know it, and I have gotten that with Benz and Ortofon MC's and have never quite gotten there with SS's MI's no matter how much I tried. I even hired a pro to come to my house and try to coax the best out of the SS Zephyr MIMC and it just didn't do it for me. Again, very good but they lacked the level of refinement and ease, almost a sense of nimbleness and agility, that I find in my MC's.