I agree completely with Raul. You just had a bad experience with a vintage phono cartridge. Why go on that pathway again? Also, while the cartridges that Chak recommends are indeed excellent, no one else I know can find them for sale as easily as Chakster seems to do. I don’t know where he shops, but NOS vintage cartridges are an increasingly rare find.
Newbie Issues: Grace F9 with Micro Seiki DD-40
Hey all - total newbie here. I’ve only been researching phono setups for a few months. I ran into some serious playback issues after trying to replace my cart. Wondering if anyone can tell me what is causing it?
A friend actually gave me a DD-40 with original MA 505 tonearm (14 g effective mass) and stock headshell. So I have been thrown into this (awesome) world of hifi in an effort to live up to this amazing gift. The DD-40 came with a Stanton 681eee cart and I immediately replaced the broken stylus with an LP Gear replica as a placeholder before upgrading. To my ears it sounds really really good after calibrating it properly (I am an entry level digital audiophile but this is my first analog experience).
Because my setup is MM for now I have fixated on the Grace F9 series as my first cart upgrade. I bought a used F-9 L on ebay from someone with great reviews and an easy return policy. The problem is the playback is absolutely horrid:
- distorted muffled sound
- incessant skipping
- needle gets stuck between tracks
I have recalibrated and readjusted many many times including starting from scratch and calibrating the entire TT and tonearm setup. Every time it still sounds the same. While doing the same steps but going back to the Stanton cart works just fine. I even replaced headshell wires and have nice cables (Kimber Kable and Van den Hul) and a Furman power conditioner. It’s running through the phono input of a Pioneer SX 838.
When I increase the tracking force beyond the recommended range for the Grace the skipping issue gets a bit better but not really. And the sound always remains distorted and muffled - that never improves.
Visibly the cart, cantilever and stylus look totally fine meaning not bent or broken. But again I’m just a newbie and have not put anything under a magnifying glass.
So all that said, with the issues I described above, what do you all think is the problem?
1) Worn out needle?
2) Bad / bent cantilever?
3) Busted cart?
4) Bad newbie calibration?
5) Cartridge / tonearm mismatch?
6) Something else?
Any help would be greatly appreciated - thanks!
YL
A friend actually gave me a DD-40 with original MA 505 tonearm (14 g effective mass) and stock headshell. So I have been thrown into this (awesome) world of hifi in an effort to live up to this amazing gift. The DD-40 came with a Stanton 681eee cart and I immediately replaced the broken stylus with an LP Gear replica as a placeholder before upgrading. To my ears it sounds really really good after calibrating it properly (I am an entry level digital audiophile but this is my first analog experience).
Because my setup is MM for now I have fixated on the Grace F9 series as my first cart upgrade. I bought a used F-9 L on ebay from someone with great reviews and an easy return policy. The problem is the playback is absolutely horrid:
- distorted muffled sound
- incessant skipping
- needle gets stuck between tracks
I have recalibrated and readjusted many many times including starting from scratch and calibrating the entire TT and tonearm setup. Every time it still sounds the same. While doing the same steps but going back to the Stanton cart works just fine. I even replaced headshell wires and have nice cables (Kimber Kable and Van den Hul) and a Furman power conditioner. It’s running through the phono input of a Pioneer SX 838.
When I increase the tracking force beyond the recommended range for the Grace the skipping issue gets a bit better but not really. And the sound always remains distorted and muffled - that never improves.
Visibly the cart, cantilever and stylus look totally fine meaning not bent or broken. But again I’m just a newbie and have not put anything under a magnifying glass.
So all that said, with the issues I described above, what do you all think is the problem?
1) Worn out needle?
2) Bad / bent cantilever?
3) Busted cart?
4) Bad newbie calibration?
5) Cartridge / tonearm mismatch?
6) Something else?
Any help would be greatly appreciated - thanks!
YL
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- 31 posts total
@hauie88 If you need assistance PM me, some people on ebay have no idea what they are selling and they are too lazy to check a cartridge before they ship it. Other people don’t know how to use internet search. Actually I’ve seen so many NOS Stanton and Pickering cartridges on ebay from American sellers, so it’s not a problem at all to find one. I even bought mine from California on ebay. Regarding Grace I would recommend F14 or LEVEL II models, those are so much better than older F9. But they are more expensive than Stanton and Pickering to models. Here is mine with original Ruby EXP cantilever and LC-OFC generator (the best from Grace). The Ruby EXP. was the latest generation of Grace Ruby LEVEL II. |
The OP needs to keep in mind just one thing: PayPal buyers protection and full refund on anything will wipe away all the problems with bad sellers, no loss for the buyer. This is another fresh image on one of my LEVEL II Ruby EXP just to tease, a used market is full of treasures, not only crap from idiots. |
I hear all of your advice and it's settled - I'll look into (eventually) getting BOTH a new cart and a (working!) vintage cart, haha. @chakster that is truly a beautiful cart. All your suggestions sound amazing but they also seem to be quite rare so I'll just have to be patient to see when they come up. Have you had any experience buying from Reverb? I have already shipped the Grace F9 back for a refund so fingers crossed everything goes smoothly. Then it's back to the drawing board. For new carts - and given my setup and newbie status - what price range do you all think I should target? For now I just want to be able to live up to the components I have. I don't want the cart to hold the system back but I also don't want to go too crazy and lock myself into a top of the line cart before I learn more about all this. Thanks! Hauie |
- 31 posts total