Denon 103r ????

Richard: With respect to the Zu 103, this is only speculation on my part as I have only experienced a wood bodied 103R, but reading between the lines at vinylasylum I get the impression that those who have experimented with both the wood body and the nude/brass top plate tend, for the most part, to prefer the presentation of the wood to nuding with a metal plate. My take on it is that, although they found the nude/metal plated 103 to be more detailed, they also found it to be a bit hi-fi-ish.

Most of the Denon fans (I believe) are drawn to its midrange and top to bottom coherence-I think the cartridge definitely leans to the warmer side of neutral and the wood body, in my experience, tends to give you more detail and slam without changing the overall impression in quite the same way that it appears nuding or metal bodying the cartridge might. Similar perhaps the sonic differences exhibited by metal and wood footers or support?

At the present, I haven't heard of anyone that has Soundsmithed in a wood body; there's a lot of speculation that might be the killer combo.

Raul, I can see we indeed have different ideas about music/sound repro, so I'll inform you and others from where I speak.

Music has been my love since childhood, both prerecorded and participatory. I play piano, guitar, percussion, trumpet, clarinet, flute, and just about anything I've ever picked up in my hands. I have owned a music store for more than 20 years and built a recording studio in the back to record myself and other people. I design and build my own tube amplification and speakers, and sometimes tweak my setup till I'm dizzy in the head.

I know what a Selmer Mark 6 Tenor sax, Guild D-40 acoustic, or Sabian medium thin 16" crash sounds like because I can walk right over to one and play it or have one of my teachers play it, anytime I want.

And I am fully aware of the limitations and intricacies of prerecorded music, analog or digital.

If I may, I would suggest you review and re-assess your 'audio priorities'.

Just to add another contraversial addition.

Try using the denon 103R with a cartridge man isolator. Works wonders.

I would like to try the wood body from Ure thou. hard to take off the standard body?

Any credance to the guy who said the 103r is phased reversed??

I'm not so sure that the cartridge is actually phase reversed so much as the pin arrangement on the Denons is different from other cartridges possibly resulting in incorrect hookup and phase reversal, but perhaps someone else can shed more light on this.

As to removing the body, this is a fun watch:

http://www.thomas-schick.com/Denon103.htm

It's pretty simple. Tried to post it as a link but had problems.

Seems the link does work!