MM or MI Cartridge?

@panzrwagn , you appear to suggest that nothing can touch a MC. I beg to differ.

For years I used a higher end Koetsu, a great MC by any standards. Last month I replaced it with a top Grado, and the difference was immediately obvious. The Grado has more dynamics, more clarity, and more sweetness. Smoothness. Not to mention, notably better tracking. That's on an air bearing TT, air bearing tonearm, and ESL's.

I have a Grado reference in one of  my vintage systems. I have it on a AR XA with a Mayware tonearm that I refurbished. It is an outstanding cartridge once you get it dialed with beautiful vocals and surprising bass. 

Dinov is right.  Since the output is somewhere in between an MC and a MM, you will have to experiment with your phono preamp setting.  Mine only had 2 settings, MM and MC.  One sounded fat, the other was weak.

If you are unwilling or unable to seek out a Decca Super Gold, +1 Nagaoka MP500. Also look at the Audio-Technica AT150ANV if you want detail and open-window clarity. I recall Fremer giving it very high marks. The Grado and Goldring (Audionote) are pretty warm sounding by some accounts.

Moving coil cartridges do indeed have the lowest inductance of any of the three types, by far, but they also have the highest moving mass. Moving iron type cartridges have the lowest moving mass on average. MM types are somewhere in between. Therefore, any response retarding effect due to hysteresis caused by inductance is compensated for by very low moving mass in the case of the moving iron cartridge. Which may explain why the general conclusion that MC cartridges exhibit superior high end clarity, based on hysteresis alone, does not conform to my long-term observations of the performance of the three types of cartridge.