Lyra Lambda Atlas/Etna

@loving this thread…. While i have the Kleos - Lambda on my crayon letter to Santa….i am casting a wider ear and eye. I also greatly appreciate @jcarr weighing in on this thread. He has directly helped me achieve better performance of my Delos in Triplaner Mk7.

best to all, love this thread, civil challenge and ideas !

I am a robot with a line contact stylus in a curved groove…

I am listening to the Etna Lamda as we speak. Vastly hot-rodded 301 with Reed 3P 10.5 into a Steelhead to my ARC Ref 6 to an Ampsandsound Nautilus driving Spendor 7.2's via Auditorium 23. 

Chuck Prophet's "No Other Love" has just been re-released on vinyl. As a somewhat overboard fan I have seen him no less that thirty times from Pittsburgh to Chicago to Covington, KY and all points in between. As is true with most under-appreciated musicians he often tours solo with just his acoustic and his trademark two mics and usually in small venues. I think I know his voice like a member of my family's. I have never heard Chuck's voice sound so life-like. I won't go into the typical audio drivel as to why his voice sounds so much more life-like than with my other well regarded Ortofon and VdH cartridges. This is truly a special phono cartridge. 

Steve Dobbins advised me to set tracking at exactly 1.72 grams using a Riverstone VTF, not 1.73 or 1.71. This has proven spot-on. I have read that Mr. Carr recommends 1.69 but.... While I am name dropping I use Brian Walsh for set-up. He has been to my home 4 times now. He installed my Etna and has since fine tuned the set-up. 

Dear @fsonicsmith  :  "  sounds so much more life-like.."

Life-like needs or means, at least, dynamic power and natural tone balanced color. This is for me.

Now and due that you own a Colibri that I don't know its " vintage " production because no two Colibri sounds exactly the same and that's why I owned/own 4 samples.

Even that and that's why I still today give to it a confidence vote on quality level performance is that the black body Colibri ( not the ones with wood top plate. ) with a 0.24mv has the " explosiveness " that helps a lot for that life-like, this Colibri handled the transients as fastest as any other cartridge I experienced in any system I heard it.

About wood I don't like it wood on cartridges other than the Benz-Micro where I owned the Ruby, Ruby 2, Ruby 3, LP and LPS. Even I heard the Cardas one.

T.

@rauliruegas @jcarr , Thanx for the response. The build quality of the Colibri makes me nervous. For a precise piece of equipment wood is not a great choice as it changes dimension with humidity. It's claim to fame is loss of the front pole allowing a shorter cantilever. That means the cantilever has less leverage over the armature. So, there is a trade off that no other manufacturer is willing to make. I would love to hear one in my system but alas, no such operation exists. 

This might be a great opportunity for someone with a little spare cash. Buy all these cartridges and rent them out for a week at a time holding the sales price in escrow in case the renter damages the cartridge or fails to return it. Charge $250/week. 20 Rents will pay most cartridges off then it is all profit.     

@mijostyn, in my experience you don’t need to be apprehensive about the built quality of the Colibri. The design is fragile by nature and mounting and dismounting a Colibri needs a very steady hand and definitely is not my idea of having a good time. Nonetheless, my Colibri XPW Blackwood is over 10 years old, has received two retips and is still performing beautifully. No sign of the wood changing dimensions or anything. My sample is the discontinued version with platinum coils (the only one such beast in existence as far as I know), so at least as ‘collectible’ as e.g. the Lyra with platinum magnets. One could get nervous about the exposed coil wires, but after a while you tend to forget this. I do use it sparingly, as vdHul isn’t getting any younger and I would be reluctant to have it retipped again by somebody else. So if you’re interested in a Colibri, my advise to you is to get one while you still can.