How does Shure V15 Type IV compare?

Thanks for all the information from everyone.  I am quite overwhelmed.   I have been away from vinyl for so long, and many of the names that were mentioned here I have never heard of.    I remember back in the late 70's when I first saved up my summer job money to buy my first stereo system (all pioneer stuff), my first cartridge was a Stanton - can't remember the model name.   I later upgraded to the Shure V15 Type IV, and never looked back.  :-)

@xcool Stanton made so many different models including very cheap models for mass market and for djs and radiostations back in the day, but we're talking about a few top of the line high-end models with Stereohedron stylus tip here, nothing else. Actually my first cartridge in the ealy 90's also was Stanton (AL500) and it was junk, needles to say it is a completely different Stanton that i own now in High-End system. Any Stanton from 881s up to 980 and 981 series, including Walter O. Stanton signature SC-100 WOS can easily complete with $3000 modern MC cartridges (being a $600-800 NOS today). And you have to read this article to make sure what is Stanton and why Doug Sax at Sheffield Lab has been using Stanton 881s as his disc mastering monitoring cartridge. 

A little bit of history:

Walter O Stanton. A pioneer in the audio field, Stanton was responsible for many of the early patents in phono cartridge and styli design and electrostatic speakers, as well as other electro mechanical items. He was one of the early leaders in the audio industry and served as president of both the Institute of Hi Fidelity and the Audio Engineering Society (AES). One of the original owners of Pickering & Company, started in 1947, he later established Stanton Magnetics Inc in 1961. He was the chairman and president of both Pickering & Co and Stanton Magnetics Inc until 1998.

Under his leadership, the various companies developed leading products in the audio, aerospace, military and communications fields with factories in Plainview, New York and West Palm Beach, Florida.

Walter O. Stanton, the inventor of an easily replaceable phonograph stylus that was crucial to creating a consumer market for audio equipment, died on Monday in Palm Beach Gardens, FL. He was 86.

In the late 1940's Mr. Stanton's slide-in stylus made it possible for users to replace a needle assembly when it wore out, instead of having to send it back to the factory. Audiophiles snapped them up for home use, and the invention became one of the basics in phonograph cartridge design.

But Mr. Stanton was as much a salesman as he was an engineer. In 1950, he bought Pickering & Company, the audio component manufacturer that first sold his patented stylus.

A decade later he founded another company, Stanton Magnetics, which was one of the first American companies to make and sell magnetic cartridges that improved sound quality and allowed for a less-expensive product in the 1970's. Both companies had operations in Plainview, N.Y., and West Palm Beach, FL.

Rather than selling the phonograph as one big console, Mr. Stanton was one of the first to separate the electronics, the turntable and the cartridges and sell them separately to consumers.

To do that effectively, he prodded the major manufacturers to arrive at standards for the mounting systems for cartridges and the type of recording on vinyl records. He served as president of the Audio Engineering Society and was inducted into the Audio Hall of Fame, family members said.

In 1967, complaining that too many homeowners still thought of audio equipment as ''assorted pieces of gear lying about connected by all kinds of wires,'' he set up five rooms at the New York National Design Center to illustrate how music could be integrated into home decor.

Mr. Stanton was born in Canton, Ohio, and graduated from Wayne State University's School of Electrical Engineering in 1939. While there, he set up one of the first student radio stations in the country. During World War II, Mr. Stanton was involved in the design and creation of mechanisms for aerospace applications.

Mr. Stanton was known for holding outings on his boat near his longtime home in Laurel Hollow, N.Y., and playing jokes on employees. He ran both of his companies until retiring in 1998

Don't understand the comment that the Nagaoka MP500 is better than the Shure v15 IV. Really? That's like saying the Rega Planar 6 is better than a Planar 1. You bet it is but its also 5x the price. I can get brand new Shure v15 IV's with original boron MR stylus's around here for $250 US. That works for me. 

It wasn't my favorite even back in the day. ADC XLM kills it (And most everything else).And if you can find a Sonus....

I briefly had a Shure v15 Type 4. It was nice, but I liked Audio Technica AT-150MLX better. Recently I bought a vintage AT 160ML. It is even better than AT-150MLX.