The Shure V15 V with a Jico SAS/B stylus VS The Soundsmith Hyperion MR and Lyra Atlas SL
On a sentimental lark I purchased two Shure V15 V bodies and one SAS/B stylus. I was always a realistic about the Shure's potential. Was comparing it to $10k+ cartridges fair? Absolutely. The Shure was considered to be one of the best cartridges of the day. Why not compare it to a few of the best we have today?
The Shure has always been considered to be unfailingly neutral. Famous recording engineers have said it sounded most like their master tapes. I do not have an original stylus for the Shure and I can not say that the Jico performs as well.
My initial evaluation was quite positive. It worked wonderfully well in the Shroder CB. With a light mounting plate and small counterbalance weight a resonance point of 8 hz was easily achieved. There was nothing blatantly wrong with the sound. There was no mistracking at 1.2 grams. You can see pictures of all these styluses here https://imgur.com/gallery/stylus-photomicrographs-51n5VF9
After listening to a bunch of favorite evaluation records my impression was that the Shure sounded on the thin side, lacking in the utmost dynamic impact with just a touch of harshness. I listened to the Shure only for four weeks as my MC phono stage had taken a trip back to the factory. I was using the MM phono stage in the DEQX Pre 8, designed by Dynavector. I have used it with a step up transformer and know it performs well. I got my MC stage back last week and cycled through my other cartridges then back to the Shure. The Soundsmith and Lyra are much more alike than different. I could easily not be able to tell which one was playing. The Lyra is the slightest touch darker. The Shure is a great value....for $480 in today's money, but it can not hold a candle to the other cartridges. They are more dynamic, smoother and quieter. They are more like my high resolution digital files. Whether or not they are $10,000 better is a personal issue. Did the DEQX's phono stage contribute to this lopsided result? Only to a small degree if any. I do have two Shure bodies and they both sound exactly the same. The Shure may have done better with a stock stylus. I do not think the age of the bodies contributes to this result at all.
Can you provide some characteristics of the Hyperion MKII MR? For example, what are things you like about it? Is it balanced and not shouty or overbearing in any of the frequencies? How long did it take to break in? I have a Hyperion MKIi and am expecting the Hyperion MKII MR in a few days. Will be interesting to hear the differences. I have two SME V arms mounted. One arm has an Air Tight Opus 1, also new, but listening feedback is for another conversation. Thanks. |
@mijostyn ESL in Australia normally means English Second Language, and represents the quarter of the population who don't speak English at home. I try to use English as a Scientific Language with precise meaning. Seems we are from two nations divided by a common language. Anyway, it appears both countries will stop today for important races. Yours is for a President, our country stops for a horse race! Australians are the heaviest gamblers in the world, even the Sydney Opera House was paid for by a state lottery ... |
@lewm Eminent Technology's sub can do DC if the blades are locked |
@mijostyn "Do you have stadium concerts down under? If you go to one you can hear midrange/bass line sources. The sound is usually awful. I do not bother any more" Yes, there was a concert last night at Sydney Olympic Park, Main Arena. Seats over 80,000. Could hear it from home! We went to a Bushfire Aid concert there a couple of years ago. Queen and Adam Lambert had played the night before, and let every other gig use their sound system. We arrived early and could hear kd lang practicing hard to get her sound right. The sound during the first session was so bad overall that we found a beer garden outside and listened from a distance. Later acts must have learned something because the sound became listenable, then good. kd lang sounded brilliant and Queen finished off in their usual style with superb sound. All from the same hardware! Queen's Brian May is an astrophysicist in his spare time. Fred Hoyle, who coined the phrase 'Big Bang' because he thought that particular origin theory was rubbish, worked out most of the nuclear reactions occurring in stars. To Fred, a star was a one-dimensional problem. Work out what happens on one line radiating from the centre and you have solved what happens on every line. Brilliant people can sometimes be wrong. And sometimes conventional wisdom is overthrown by a single visionary, at which point everybody else becomes wrong. Newton, Einstein, Hawking: each did this/ |
In fact a fan is what gave him the idea.