Should people with no turntable or reel to reel be considered audiophiles?

Agree with cart being most important. I’m not looking to do anything there. I have a Van Den Hul one Special that I may need to get serviced within the next year. I got a great deal on it a while back and don’t think I can come close to its sound for the expected $500 service. It’s a $1850 cartridge.

Also I have both .5 meter and 1.5 meter Kimber PBJ interconnects. Question was whether there would be any difference using the shorter one in between the Phono stage and preamp.

I know price does not always equal quality, but this cart works perfectly with the phono stage which has the load setting dialed in at 200ohms, precisely the carts recommended setting.

You can use 47k Ohm with any MC, there are many nice phono stage with optional loading, the manufacturer recommendations is not mandatory. Same with MM cartridges, 47k Ohm is not mandatory, in many cases 100k Ohm for MM is better.

Once you will try many cartridges and many different loading options you can say what is better for yourself.

I tried 3-$5k LOMC cartridges and they are no better than some $1k MM (tried many rare ones).

Regarding cables the sort one is the most important between SUT and Phono stage for example.

Balanced phono cable is another story, it’s not just about the length.

So use the .5 meter cable instead of the 1.5 M one?

Sokohgear I've been accused because of the extent I have labored to acquire a  high end system.  It's a putdown of my hobby.  It probably happens to all hobbyists.  

Grado has made quite a few high end and mid-fi moving iron cartridges.  I've heard some very fine moving magnet cartridges.  An audiophile could definitely own either of these non moving coil cartridges for a high quality analog system.