New cartridge vs. Re-tipped


What I am trying to ask is, what are the down sides, if any, to buying a re-tipped cartridge as opposed to a brand new cartridge. Do you get less hours with a re-tipped, a completely different sound? Is tracking ability compromised?

Thanks

audiorusty

There is no cut and dry answer. It depends on the cartridge, who is doing the service, and what their retipping service includes. It can be done cheaply and/or badly and change the original cartridge for the worse, or it can be done very well at greater cost (e.g. in the case of Lyra or Dynavector factory rebuild service) and result in something the same as the original and possibly even better.

There is no one good answer to such a general question.

Like @dwette said.  And try and do some research on your specific case. Who did the re-tip? If you can find out, read reviews of their work.

I had a Denon DL103 with a missing cantilever. I sent it off to an independent re-tipper who had great feedback.  The upgraded cart I got back was transformed to another level. There are good re-tippers out there.