Helikon LOADING

I think, most of us are on the right track, Raul with his opinion and Gmorris with his explanations. When the wire in the arm is silver or copper, you can choose different loads, next is the wire from the termination box to the preamp, same story. I agree, that you can go the one and only way with the manuf. recommendation, but do you think, that all of them use a 1.class phono preamp? Or step ups? Or tubes? Or transistor? Even the tonearm material has different damping influences ....

Dear Gmorris: This is only to clarify: when I speak about manufacturer load impedance recomennded I'm speaking not about the very wide impedance value range that usually comes on the manual I'm speaking that I ask directly to the manufacturer for his advice about, so that wide range scale it converts in a single value or a very short value range. Normally the load impedance that " see " the cartridge is: the one from the tonearm internal wires, the one from the tonearm interconnect cable and the input impedance of the phonopreamp that in a well phono stage design is the resistor at the input: the one that we can change it for modified the load impedance value.
These three impedance stages are the ones that we have to taje in count fo to have the right load impedance value where the frequency response is flat. There are others subjects about like what you say: " by stray impedances ", but those other subjects does not affect signify the frequency response. And yes we can go in deep about any time you want: welcomed!!!

" is not purely resistive, it contains a reactive component. ". Btw, is inductive and capacitive.

Regards and enjopy the music.
Raul.

I have never owned a cartridge that I did not experiment with,regarding proper loading.I only care about how it performs based upon my tastes.Yes,the ultimate loading usually complies with a mfgr recommendation,but not always.Not "set in stone"!
So my conclusions(which is NO guarantee of anything,other than "I like it,in my system,that way")are---

Gmorris "1"!!

Raul "0"!!

BTW--I still love you both-:)

Don't get too carried away,with my affections though!!!

Raul:

Z = R + iX

I refer to the non resistive part as reactive (reactance)
You can have capacitive reactance and inductive reactance.

So what is your point?

Gmorris - isn't it Z*Z=R*R + iX*iX?

Other thing, nobody has talked about loading providing mechanical damping of the cartridge. I wonder if it is important?