Anyone notice different amounts of surface noise with different arms?

I’ve heard some arm swaps using the same table and cartridge where the sound changed and apparent surface noise changed too.  Arms that make the sound seem livelier also tend to make noise more prominent, while arms that sound more precise and tight are quieter.  I think it has to do with how well an arm damps the vibrational energy dumped into the arm by the cartridge.  Surface noise is a high energy impulse of extremely short duration; if the arm is well damped, that pulse of energy does not keep moving back and forth in the arm and headshell and thereby moving the cartridge and being read by the cartridge signal generating element.  Musical signal will also reverberate more in a less damped arm, but, that will be perceived as natural reverberation because it is correlated with the music.  Ticks and pops don’t sound like music because of their short, very fast impulse and lack of harmonic structure and so they stick out and sound louder if they persist because they aren’t damped quickly.  
 

That is not to say that well damped arms sound better because they reduce artificial reverberation.  That “something added” might be a plus, depending on one’s taste and system synergy.  

Dragging a rock through a spiral groove on a rotating plastic disk will always have surface noise. 

It is not the arm. It is a slight difference in the cartridge alignment. Small changes in overhang and VTA can affect the amount of surface noise you hear. All the best arms of similar mass are going to sound exactly the same as long as cartridge alignment is exactly the same.

@larryi I wish I had your imagination. 

Ivor Tiefenbrun of Linn would not agree that "all the best arms of similar mass sound exactly the same" unless you define "the best" as those that sound the same! He was notorious for throwing records around during demonstrations, in part to show that scratches, pops and crackles were far less obvious with Linn products. He went to enormous lengths to minimise free play between the record and the stylus, for example by using the same grade of stainless steel so bearings and other components expanded and contracted at the same rate, and therefore could be adjusted to very tight tolerances. Propagation of unwanted impulses was suppressed, especially compared with popular arms such as those by SME, who did not make turntables at that time.
I am assuming the same cartridge in both arms, correctly aligned.