Thinking about switching cartridges.

Tomic, I’ve had the 17D3 in my 505 with a CF headshell, possibly in my FR64S, also in CF headshell, and now in Viv Float in CF with shim. It sounds best in the Viv without a doubt. And now I will proceed to my fallout shelter.

@mijostyn  : " but I cannot say there is any advantage in a diamond cantilever over boron, ruby or cactus spine. "

That was your very specific " dude ", you not even mentioned " everything the same " but in your next post following my answer you said you know everything about YM but you just fogeret and like tomic posted " but there is more at play such as cantilever mass and dimensions ".

A way unwise post and that's why I just ignored the tomic post about.

R.

@rauliruegas I'm afraid I do not understand your last post. All I can say for sure is I now have cartridges with diamond, boron and cactus spine cantilevers and all three are fine cartridges. I can say from a tracking performance perspective the cactus spine can handle the highest groove velocities. It is also a thing of beauty. From a sonic perspective all three sound remarkably similar so It might just be an all roads lead to Rome situation. 

@lewm From a stylus perspective I do not think there is any difference between a natural and synthetic diamond both can have various levels of inclusions. I have looked at some styluses that were black with contamination and these styluses are going to wear out faster and are more likely to damage grooves. Again there is a level of quality and selection. The more expensive cartridges tend to get much cleaner styluses. I have a very inexpensive Ortofon 78 RPM cartridge. The stylus is spherical and swaged to a brass ferule (not naked). It is poorly polished and very dark. Another interesting attribute which anyone can see without a microscope is the diamonds of the more expensive cartridges are much smaller lowering the effective mass of the assembly. Less expensive cartridges using an aluminum tube for a cantilever with have the diamond pressed into the crimped end of the cantilever with a lot of excess material while the more expensive cartridges use much lighter mountings. With every cartridge made there are various levels of quality. The more expensive cartridges are more consistent but you can still get a dud. And, you had better take a lot of food down there with you:-)))

Which do you prefer, press fit or a big gob of glue? And which adds more superfluous mass to increase inertia? 

I do suppose with no supporting data that a synthetic diamond is mor likely to display those imperfections you describe than would a natural diamond, but it’s pure guessing.