Cartridge Opinions - Sorry

I wound up getting a Hana ML and a Feickert protractor so I can do my own setups = freedom to experiment with other cartridges as the opportunities come up.

I only have about 5 hours on the cartridge but I'm happy with it. This is my first microline & the one thing I've noticed  is how quiet it is. Surface noise seems dramatically reduced. I'm not sure if this is because of the microline or if my previous 30 year cartridges had worn styli and dried out suspensions that accentuated noise?

Thanks for all the replies.

There is no sense in question about ''all carts''. The most members
have experience with limited number of carts. Except Raul, J. Carr
and perhaps ''the well infomed memer from (Dutch) New Zeeland''.
Problem with Raul is that he get seduced in disputes about not
relevant details. So the question asked is answered with own
experiece and preference by individual members. Those are
worthless because there is no consensus about anything. 
Better is to ask questions about particular cartridges. Then only
those who know the cart can answer the question based on their
own experience. 

 the Denon 103 is a pretty nice cartridge for the money.

It is. Lots of nice comments from our customers.

Second the suggestion of a Hana cartridge.

And a third. One of my employees uses this cartridge- tracks anything.

Dear @nandric : "  disputes about not relevant details. "

Well certainly is not relevant to you but the subject ( " detail." ) to put the tonearm importance above the cartridge in LP analog rig is more relevant for some of us that what you can think.

In this kind of " disputes "/discussions always are learning audio information shared for the people involved that helps any one to improve his audio knowledge levels and for me one forums target is this precisely: learn.

Only an opinion.

R.

I

I fail to understand the purpose of ranking components by value. I see often contentious posts:
Cartridge vs cartridge setup
Cartridge vs cartridge+tonearm

Everything in the audio chain matters.
Do cartridges sound different? Yes
Is a subpar cartridge audible? Yes
Do tonearms affect the sound? Yes
Does platter surfaces affect the sound? Yes
Does platter material affect the sound? Yes
Does....Yes.... you get the picture

The entire audio chain matters. With the exception of those who buy pretty, most of us do a cost/benefit or more specificity a price/performance analysis to evaluate components as 99.9% of us have budgetary constraints (limited bank accounts). When we elevate our audio chains, we look at affordable upticks and address bottlenecks (weak links). If, for example, I continuously upgrade my audio chain with the exception of speakers, it’s likely that my speakers will become my weakest link.

We each have unique audio chains with various strengths/weakness links. Other than starting arguments, what’s the purpose of ranking? Since when does “this is better than that” trump the importance of maximum audio performance by maximizing audio chain components?

Forgive me if I’m reading this wrong, it may be that good to great cartridge setups commonly exists, in @atmasphere experience of “optimum” cartridge setup by others is rare. When you think about a stylus in the groove, is a very minuscule stylus/diamond tilt audible? Absolutely!

What complicates setup is that less than perfect stylus to cantilever mating is common, and occasionally the cantilever is less than perfectly mounted. Most will align using the cartridge body which doesn’t address this less than perfect mating/mounting. From the side, I surmise that few mount it to the ideal 92degrees or to whatever one seems ideal. I also surmise that few check the accuracy of stylus to cantilever mating. Now granted there are a few talented experienced folk that can reach optimization by ear, but many/most have not experienced “optimum”. @atmasphere seems to be alluding that there’s much more performance that can be wrung out of your existing cartridge if it is not yet optimized.