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Upgrade my tone arm?

I proudly own a super nice Woodsong Garrard 301 with an Ortophon RS 309D arm and a Myajima Shalabi cartridge. My phono stage is it he one in my Atma-Sphere MP-3 preamp. Upgrade fever has taken hold and I am thinking of getting a Triplaner tonearm. I do have dual arm boards on my Woodsong. I understand that the Triplaner would be a significant upgrade. However, since I am fairly new to analog, it has been a steep learning curve. Such a big investment is in question since I don’t completely understand how much of an improvement a significantly better arm would be. Any advise would be appreciated.
mglik
bukanona
174 posts
 
+ for chakster

Also if you can get real upgrade from Dynavector DV507, it's more versatile arm than Ikeda.
mijostyn's avatar
mijostyn
8,570 posts
 
bukanona, to be polite the DV507 is a nightmare. 
mglik, it is always best to start out with a lighter arm. You can always add mass, hard to take it away.
chakster, I love Reed arms. The 2G is a better design than the 3P. Both use the same tonearm wands of varying masses. The 2g is a neutral balance arm while the 3P is not. The 2G's vertical bearings are two points in the plane of the record (and stylus) with the counterbalance also in the same plane, just like the Kuzma 4 Point. Once you have the tonearm in neutral balance it will stay in whatever vertical position you put it in while the 3P will swing up and down around the balance point like a scale. This is called static balance. For a tonearm neutral balance is always better. The Schroder CB and Triplanar are also examples of neutral balance arms. Interestingly, the Schroder LT is a static balance arm. I think Frank was stuck with this because of the arm's geometry and the swinging bearing platform did not give him room to lower the vertical bearing to the plane of the record. Still an incredible arm.
gmercer
193 posts
 
I recently upgraded to a Thales Simplicity tonearm. I could not be happier or more impressed. If you want a significant upgrade to your arm I would consider it, or the Thales Easy. Both utilize tangential tracking in a pivoted design, and so if you would like an upgrade that you may really hear I'd consider something substantial like the Thales.
The Schroeder LT mentioned earlier provides that same benefit too.
bukanona
174 posts
 
mijostyn, no it isn't. 
chakster's avatar
chakster
6,144 posts
 
chakster, I love Reed arms. The 2G is a better design than the 3P. Both use the same tonearm wands of varying masses. The 2g is a neutral balance arm while the 3P is not. The 2G's vertical bearings are two points in the plane of the record (and stylus) with the counterbalance also in the same plane, just like the Kuzma 4 Point. Once you have the tonearm in neutral balance it will stay in whatever vertical position you put it in while the 3P will swing up and down around the balance point like a scale. This is called static balance. For a tonearm neutral balance is always better.

Never tried 3G, but got my 3P "12 Cocobolo for a long time and it's stunning 


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