Hear my Cartridges....🎶


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.....🤪
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.....🤗
128x128halcro
Dear friends @halcro  : As with ruby/saphyre diamond is synthetic too and more a hype than a true reality that cartridge with diamond cantilevers performs best, it's only marketing.

The manufacturers of diamond cantilever cartridges put very special attention/care on each one an all parameters, measures and voicing with their diamond cantilever models to the cartridges can achieve a different ( but not really better ) sound quality than the same models with boron cantilevers but if those same designers put the same grade of care, tigth tolerances, voicing, etc, etc with the boron ones these boron cantilever cartridge will outperforms the diamond one.

For me and till today boron in that specific job is unbeatable.

Regards and enjoy the MUSIC NOT DISTORTIONS,
R.
...and fretless; for that distinctive singing sound. Great player, Victor Wooten. Some bass! 👍
Some crazy post here again about ceramic base of the Audio-Technica cartridges, it looks like someone pretending to be more knowledgeable that Audio-Technica engineers, right ?

Let me add one quote directly from the Audio-Technica manual for their AT-ML series of reference MM cartridges:

*** "Audio-Technica engineers have ensured against unwanted parasitic vibration with an anti-resonance ceramic mounting base." ***

In other worlds Ceramic Base is there only for one reason and this reason is to eliminate resonance, but the Mexican claimed the anti-resonance base increasing the resonance. One of the most stup*d statements I have ever read on this forum!

AT-ML180 is one of the best MM cartridges ever made.
Ceramic base is anti-resonance base designed by AT engineers for this cartridge.
This is all you need to know.

Anybody asked about Saec or Victor headshell ? How those shells from different manufacturers related to AT-ML top of the line moving magnet cartridges ?