Comparison of sonic qualities of some tonearms

@drbond You misunderstand me. A tonearm can not improve sound quality. it can only degrade it. The difference in sound quality can be rather large between an excellent arm and a not so excellent arm due to degradation. But, between two well designed arms the differences in sonic quality are as I stated.

@billstevenson The Rabco? The one we had in the shop did not know which direction to go:-))) You bet! Unipivots are a low cost, lazy solution to tonearm design and violate what is perhaps the main principle in tonearm design, holding the cartridge rigidly in position over the record with only two degrees of freedom. I worked in retail during the same time period!

@asvjerry Not so simple. Most of them are examples of the tail wagging the dog. 

@tomic601 I think a lot of audiophiles are waving something else. 

Viv Float +1!

Beware of old guys who once worked in an audio store decades ago. Those memories, shrouded in the mist of time, are not always to be trusted. Even though the Rabco did have its gremlins.

@whart  Because I am a dog.

As long as you can adjust the effective mass, a dogmatic tonearm will run any cartridge at it's best. There is no magic to tonearm design only compromises. The pivoted offset arm makes one huge compromise for the sake of simplicity and that is it is not tangential. Most of us think that is a reasonable compromise to make given the state or the art in tangential tonearm design with three possible exceptions the REED 5A, 5T and the Schroder LT. 

@lewm The Rabco was a frigin haunted house!

@rauliruegas It's good to be back on the reservation:-)