Gimbal vs unipivot tonearms


Curious as to the difference between these types of arms. In my experience, it seems as if unipivots are much more difficult to handle.

Is it like typical debates - depends on the actual product design/build or is one better sounding or less expensive or harder to set up....?
sokogear
Antigrunge, experience is the best teacher and yes, sometimes things really are that simple... except for the simple minded. 

Clearthink, you are a riot. It is physics and science that I rely on. You on the other hand seem to prefer mythology. You have to put the computer games down for a while and visit reality. 

Elliott, the SME 3009 is in no way shape or form a unipivot arm. It has ball races for the horizontal axis and a knife edge bearing for the vertical axis. 

@chakster  The 3P is a fine tonearm and Its azimuth on the fly feature is very creative, I just prefer the 2G. My reasoning is the 2G's vertical bearing is down at record level and it is a neutral balance arm. So from a technical standpoint it is a better design. Is it going to sound better? Not if your records are flat or close to flat. Is the Azimuth on the fly feature worth sacrificing optimum bearing geometry? I guess that is a personal choice. 


Dear friends: I'm with @mijostyn conclusion in this specific regards.

I owned several unipivots and I still have one from Grace and what for me is the best unipivot: Satin and I think that I still have one from Stax ( I think is unipivot. ). I owned Moerch, Audiocraft and other, not any more.

I have to say that under specific and controled circumstances  Unipivots could sound pretty decent.

Normally I don't recomend to any audiophile that can goes with unipivot tonearms.

The real problem with unipivots is not only what we can " see " but what we can't " see " and that's happening at microscopic land down in the cartridge/tonearm grooves tracking where the stylus tip it's figth really hard against the grooves thatneeds to track and where in motion that stylus tip is disturbed for very strong developed forces in almost all directions along all the LP imperfections.
To achieve a decent job down there that stylus tip needs stability, the kind of stability a gimball tonearm can gives to it and that an unipivot can't.

Normally the LP grooves are recorded at different velocities depening of the score and in the high velocity grooves the stylus tip is literally jumping ( sometimes we listen that distortion level and sometimes we don't but exist. ) an unipivot only makes things worst.
Gimball tonearm permits to avoid that " behavior "? certainly not but helps in better way to that cartridge stylus tip to track in way better way and this is very important when we listen the reproduced sound by that cartridge.

Someone measured what happens down there and its differences between using a gimball tonearm against an unipivot? not that I know about.


The kind of question like in this thread in reallity it's open to each one way of thinking.

My experiences in " hundreds " of systems tells me gimball is the road to go " safety ".


Regards and enjoy the MUSIC NOT DISTORTIONS,
R.
@rauliruegas , you can't possibly agree with me! That will make you a marked man for sure. Everyone will think you are an arrogant SO who thinks he knows everything. You sure you want to do this?

No really, thanx for the support. Geniuses think alike:-)
Sounds like for most people, gimbal is the way to go, which is probably why the most practical company, Rega, uses that design exclusively for the best value in tonearms.

I never understood the appeal of the hard to handle, wobbly unipivot, but for some people it can sound better and is worth the trouble I guess. 

Like everything else in this hobby, it's a matter of what you're willing to do or spend to get the last couple % of improvement you perceive.  

A couple contributors here have written unipivot arms off, and I have also. Although my dream table is an SME, they don't mention gimbal or unipivot in their Series V arm description. I guess it is a modified unipivot?