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Hear my Cartridges....đŸŽ¶

Many Forums have a 'Show your Turntables' Thread or 'Show your Cartridges' Thread but that's just 'eye-candy'.... These days, it's possible to see and HEAR your turntables/arms and cartridges via YouTube videos.
Peter Breuninger does it on his AV Showrooms Site and Michael Fremer does it with high-res digital files made from his analogue front ends.
Now Fremer claims that the 'sound' on his high-res digital files captures the complex, ephemeral nuances and differences that he hears directly from the analogue equipment in his room.
That may well be....when he plays it through the rest of his high-end setup 😎
But when I play his files through my humble iMac speakers or even worse.....my iPad speakers.....they sound no more convincing than the YouTube videos produced by Breuninger.
Of course YouTube videos struggle to capture 'soundstage' (side to side and front to back) and obviously can't reproduce the effects of the lowest octaves out of subwoofers.....but.....they can sometimes give a reasonably accurate IMPRESSION of the overall sound of a system.

With that in mind.....see if any of you can distinguish the differences between some of my vintage (and modern) cartridges.
VICTOR X1
This cartridge is the pinnacle of the Victor MM designs and has a Shibata stylus on a beryllium cantilever. Almost impossible to find these days with its original Victor stylus assembly but if you are lucky enough to do so.....be prepared to pay over US$1000.....đŸ€Ș
VICTOR 4MD-X1
This cartridge is down the ladder from the X1 but still has a Shibata stylus (don't know if the cantilever is beryllium?)
This cartridge was designed for 4-Channel reproduction and so has a wide frequency response 10Hz-60KHz.
Easier to find than the X1 but a lot cheaper (I got this one for US$130).
AUDIO TECHNICA AT ML180 OCC
Top of the line MM cartridge from Audio Technica with Microline Stylus on Gold-Plated Boron Tube cantilever.
Expensive if you can find one....think US$1000.

I will be interested if people can hear any differences in these three vintage MM cartridges....
Then I might post some vintage MMs against vintage and MODERN LOMC cartridges.....đŸ€—
128x128halcro
halcro's avatar
halcro OP
2,664 posts
 
Could you tell which one is lighter or darker in colour ? Is boron darker ?
Hi Harold,
The Glanz MFG-610LX is darker than most of my Beryllium cantilevers....but not as dark as most of my Boron ones 🧐
So I don't think colour (in this case) is an infallible indicator.....
Regards

frogman
7,386 posts
 
Wonderful music and Stern sounds great!

“any perceptible differences”?  Couldn’t be more obvious.  Amazing what a difference different cantilever material makes.

Beryllium cantilever sounds way too dry and almost totally lacking natural instrumental color.  Timbres sound dry and bleached out.  Strange piano sound.  Violin sound is better, but still too wiry and thin in the highest register.

Ruby sounds much more natural with just a touch of appropriate juiciness and natural color in the violin’s timbre.  Piano sounds MUCH more realistic and weightier.  

Complicating matters however is that “dry with slightly bleached out timbre” is a sound that I associate with some Columbia “Six Eyes”.  So, is the berillium being more honest about what is on the record while the Ruby is adding a bit of juice?  Regardless, the Ruby sounds much more like real.  Neither tracks flawlessly.

halcro's avatar
halcro OP
2,664 posts
 
I agree with you Frogman....
And it's something I didn't expect as I generally prefer beryllium cantilevers...đŸ€”

And my apologies for messing up the cartridge names....
Of course they are the GRACE LEVEL II/Beryllium and GRACE LEVEL II/Ruby.
Not SHURES.........
Trouble is, I can't now edit the Post to correct the titles.
I've done it on the YouTube videos though.

Thanks again for the comments...
harold-not-the-barrel
895 posts
 
Henry, thanks for illustrating the colour subject. It seems to me that your "later stock" GLANZ MFG 610LX has a tube boron cantilever likewise does mine from mid eighties and beryllium was probably never used. As the original GLANZ MFG 61 is long ago discontinued the MFG 610LX is "the most prestige model among the GLANZ MF cartridges" and it does sound excellent as IÂŽm currently revisiting my sample.
Many audiophiles praise the Grace F-9 Ruby as the best sounding of the F-9 series, I have read over the years in many Hi-Fi forums...
halcro's avatar
halcro OP
2,664 posts
 
You’re welcome Harold.
I think you’re probably right, except it’s a ‘hollow’ tube....and I don’t recall seeing a hollow boron tube before?

The cartridges in the shoot-out above are NOT F-9 Graces.
They are F-8 Level II....
Different animals altogether. Two to three times the price of an F-9 Ruby đŸ€Ș
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