MoFi v/s UHQR

@sokogear: The two best known moving iron pickups are from Grado (U.S.A.) and London/Decca (England). Both are very high output designs, the London/Decca 5mv!

@lalitk - that's exactly what I said - they (Elusive Disc) charge tax if you live in a state that charges it. That changed fairly recently - you used to be able to buy records from them in sales tax states without paying it. Then the Amazon rule kicked in that removed the advantage that on line vendors had over brick and mortar companies. There is some minimum of sales in a state that a company has to do to force them to collect the tax.

@bdp24 - over in the US I think Soundsmith is more popular with the higher end audio market than Grade which makes some very inexpensive cartridges. 5mv output sounds like it would blow up my phono stage!

Yeah @sokogear, while with mc pickups you need to have enough gain, with the Londons and Deccas you need to have not too much (for low noise and freedom from overload distortion). In their Mani phone amp, Schitt Audio includes a gain setting of 33dB, specifically for those pickups. In their Andros phono amp, Zesto Audio includes an input impedance setting of 15kHz, specifically for the Londons/Deccas. They have quite a rabid cult fan base.

Grado has long offered both very inexpensive entry-level pickups and (relatively) high-priced statement models. I had a cheap one back in the 1980's, but have never heard their higher priced offerings.

Oops, not 15kHz, but rather 15K ohms. The Deccas (and to a lesser extent the Londons) can benefit from a lower than standard 47K ohms input impedance, and a little extra capacitance.

In the late-1980’s I was graced with a phone call from Decca uber-enthusiast (and New York Audio Labs owner, as well as a very entertaining hi-fi writer) Harvey Rosenberg, in which he shared with me a lot of his wisdom regarding the idiosyncratic nature of the Decca design. At that time the changes made when John Wright took over management of the company (and changed the name to London) had yet to transpire, and sample-to-sample variability was notoriously inconsistent. Harvey advised me to load Deccas with an input impedance of anywhere from 10K ohms and up, and 200-300 pF of capacitance.

That variability was greatly reduced by John Wright, and London’s were made to a significantly higher standard than were the Deccas. John Wright retired a coupla years back, and the new owners are working on getting the company’s products back into production. I am very happy to already own a London Super Gold (with Decapod mounting system and Line Contact stylus) and a London Reference, neither of which would I sell at any price.