The Schroeder has arrived

Dear friends: I already post in the past: I try to match cartridges/tonearms combinations with out take in count their resonance frecuency and till to now I 'm sucess about.

I'm not saying that the resonance frecuency is not important, it is but there are many issues others than the resonance frecuency that define the quality sound reproduction of " that " combination.

I can tell you many examples, one of them: the Ortofon MC 2000 is 11gr./20cu and I try with severals tonearms and with a very high mass SAEC tonearm was its best sound/match ( resonance frecuency: 4.5Hz ), right now I'm trying the MC 2000 with another high mass tonearm: Dynavector DV-505.

So, we have not to be " crazy " to meet exactly the resonance frecuency for an excellent performance.

When I ask to Jan Allaerts about the compliance of the MC2 Finish Gold for I can match with a tonearm, here is his answer:

+++++ " Hi Raul,,



The compliance from our cartridges is not relevant, if you have a good arm and turntable , you can track 300 µmm, with this cartridge so if you calculate and project this to compliance you get 70 but nobody believe that so, the important thing is the arm can work with cartridges from 10 Gr mass and more,

Second if you build in the cartridge set in full parallel to the record, first after ( with 180 our 200 Gr vinyl ) you listen to voice on a record and put the arm a little higher no lower settings and adjust you have the most air our room around the voice that play, that is the point you leave it normal is this 1 our 2 mm higher ( NO MORE )



Regards



Jan " +++++

I try my MC2 with seven tonearms and the best match is with the SME IV.

My experience tell me that there are some " things " that I can't explain in full scientific way or common sense about the " irrelevant " resonance frecuency issue: the MC 2000 example is not the only one: I test a cartridge/tonearm combination that its resonance frecuency is 10Hz and sounds only good and the same cartridge with other tonearm with 6Hz resonance frecuency sounds excellent. This can tell me that the resonance frecuency can be only that a: resonance frecuency value.

So, Sirspeedy/Flyingred: don't worry too much about. There are other issues that defines the sound reproduction quality: cartridge frecuency response, load impedance, tonearm energy dissipation, tonearm ringing, tonearm vibrational damping, tonearm wiring, tonearm bearing or not bearing, arm board, TT, phono preamp accuracy, etc, etc, ....

Btw, Thom my LP never sound better than with my MAX 282. We have differents experiences with the same cartridge and one of the reasons is that we have differents audio systems and maybe differents music/sound reproduction priorities.

The stereo home music/sound reproduction is a very complex process that have many " sides/faces ", that's is what do so interesting and always a challenge.
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Regards and enjoy the music.
Raul.

Regards and enjoy the music.
Raul.

Is there a case for coming up with a TT's "compliance" figure and taking that into account? That would be acceptable for a suspended TT -- but rather nebulous in other cases I guess...:( OTOH, mass of the TT's moving parts probably play a role too, in the cartridge-tonearm combo's performance.

Is there a mechanical engineer out there who could consider the case?

Frank,
A friend with much experience with the Denon 103 family believes the 5cu spec is for vertical compliance only. His measurements indicate a lateral compliance of about 10cu, much closer to the mainstream of cartrdiges. Does that tally with your experiments?

On the whole I'm with Raul on this topic. Science has only gone so far, and it's not far enough to provide all the answers. While gross mismatches should probably be avoided - unless you own 15 arms, 30 cartridges and love to experiment! - it is a waste of time trying to predict musical performance from mass and compliance numbers. There are other factors, not published in anyone's specs, that effect how any arm/cartridge combo will sound.

George,sorry,I don't want to come off as a snob.Your question was a compliment.For that,thanks.You may know some of my BKLYN pals,though.Do you know Sid Marks,or Dave Nemzer?

Hi Doug, Raul ...

I wonder if I am doing a disservice by publishing the mass/compliance chart. I think some explanatory notes should be added and I will do so.

This all goes back to listening being the final arbiter of "goodness". I need to put some sort of advisory on the spreadsheet to the effect that treating the numbers as being an instant recipe for success is just not possible.

The idea was keep people from starting off with completely wacky combinations like a Shure with an SME 3012R. Now, some have reported success with weird combinations, and I'm not saying that it isn't possible If you were a gambling man however, it wouldn't be the smart place to start, unless (through lists like this) you hear reports of special combinations making magik.

If people get out of this that once you "run the numbers", you are done, they will likely be stopping short of the finish line.

As both of you have wisely observed, the numbers are only the beginning of the story. As you have no doubt have experimented, two different combinations resulting in the same res. freq. can result in one combination sounding at or near its best, with the other one sounding ... er ... suboptimal.

The Benzes seem to be one example of it being dangerous to go too low - below 8 or 9 Hz (as observed - not calculated). OTOH, Denons and Dynavectors for example are quite happy down in that range - at least on unsuspended decks.

Cheers,
Thom